Samsung Electronics’ main workers’ union in South Korea, the National Samsung Electronics Union (NSEU), has declared a four-day strike beginning Thursday to pressure the business for higher pay and bonuses. The strike comes after failed talks with management in July.
The South Korean internet giant’s largest labour union announced plans to go on strike from August 15 to 18, directing its striking members to refuse to work on Liberation Day on Thursday and work in shifts until Sunday.
Since January, the union and management have undertaken multiple rounds of talks but have been unable to reach an agreement on the salary rise rate, vacation system, and bonus structure.
During the walkout, Samsung’s main union, which represents more than 30% of the company’s overall staff, would refuse holiday work and any flexible scheduling.
Despite its brief duration, the union believes the strike will have a big influence on the corporation.
August 15 is a national holiday in South Korea, so many employees have already planned to take the day off, and Samsung may struggle to locate enough replacement workers to meet labour shortages caused by the strike action.
The NSEU has been waging strike action at Samsung Electronics sites since June 7, when employees were urged to use paid annual vacation to participate in a first one-day walkout.
Union members are requesting an additional day of leave each year to commemorate the union’s founding, a 5.6 per cent pay increase – as opposed to the 5.1 per cent Samsung had agreed to, improvements to the company’s performance-based bonus system, and fair financial compensation for all union members who participated in the strike.
A union spokesman indicated during a YouTube live broadcast that the timing was carefully picked since office staff cannot easily replace manufacturing line workers during this period.
Management stated that it will seek to avoid production delays and will follow the “no work, no pay” policy for striking employees.
We earlier reported that to improve its artificial intelligence capabilities and provide users with more tailored experiences and content on its devices, Samsung had acquired the UK knowledge graph company Oxford Semantic Technologies.
