Employer appears more concerned about lawsuit than workers

Sixty call centre workers at Latitude Finance (provider of GEM Visa) hung up their phones today and took to the streets of central Auckland over a break down in pay negotiations. The company that provides the GEM Visa credit card has only offered a 3% pay increase and the workers say that it just isn’t enough.

The striking workers were using the life size Baldwin as the company engaged him as the spokesperson for the GEM visa card with the tagline of “You can do better.”

FIRST Union Retail Organiser Kate Davis was shocked at the company reaction to the strike.

Davis says that as the workers hung up their phones and filed out of the call centre the company were more worried about the use of an image of Alec Baldwin than they were about the workers’ pay claim.

“A company spokesperson was trying to confiscate our Alec. The sole focus of her concern was the use of the Alec and a possible law suit. The company paid Alec a million for five hours making the ad, and what they are offering workers would barely pay for a car park for a day. The whole thing was surreal.”

Ms Davis says Latitude employees have had minimal if not stagnant wage increases with many leaving the company because of the wages.

“Their sales and customer support service roles require a unique set of skills that their employer simply doesn’t recognise. These workers are struggling to make ends meet as the cost of living in Auckland rises, and the wages for their hard work doesn’t reflect this. The GEM Visa (powered by Latitude) tagline, ‘You can do better’ is fairly applicable here.”

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