Dear ABBOA members,
As you are aware, most of the Banks Officer's In-House union namely AMCO Maybank, KEPAK Bank Muamalat, KEPAK CIMB and were established more than 10 years. These Associations had concurred more than ONE Collective Agreement.
Whereas Affinbank Berhad Officers Association ( ABBOA ) has been dormant from 2001 until 2004 due to ABBOA ex-committee resigned from the Bank. We take the initiative to activate the Association and managed to get recognition from the Ministry Human Resource on 4 June 2008
Ask yourself, why it took so long to get recognition. The answer is simple. The Bank know that the Union will bargain for better terms and condition / benefits. So, the Bank set lots of condition for example disagreed to include VP4 in ABBOA membership scope. Eventually, after 4 years of struggling, we managed to clear the first hurdle.
The next hurdle is the negotiation process. We took nearly four months to prepare the proposal. It is a very challenging task because this is our first Collective Agreement. But with the assistance from AMCO, Maybank, Kepak Muamalat and CIMB, we managed to submit our proposal to the Bank on 31 July 2008, one month after recognition
Unfortunately, they can't give 100% assistance. They encourage the Exco to learn and experience the process of negotiation. During the learning process, sometimes we are unaware about the consequences. For example, wearing protest badge. By right, the members should be wearing protest badge immediately after we declared deadlock . But the intention of wearing protest badge were made known to the Bank. They warned the Association on dress code and will not hesitate to take disciplinary action.
The objective of wearing protest badge is to expedite the negotiation process at Industrial Court. Since we have received the letter from Industrial Relation Department for a conciliation ( pendamaian ) on 23 July 2009, two months after we filed trade dispute to Industrial Relation Department on 26 May 2009, we decided to hold our intention until the appropriate time.
For your information, the following is what transpire between Bank and the Association during the conciliation :
As you are aware, most of the Banks Officer's In-House union namely AMCO Maybank, KEPAK Bank Muamalat, KEPAK CIMB and were established more than 10 years. These Associations had concurred more than ONE Collective Agreement.
Whereas Affinbank Berhad Officers Association ( ABBOA ) has been dormant from 2001 until 2004 due to ABBOA ex-committee resigned from the Bank. We take the initiative to activate the Association and managed to get recognition from the Ministry Human Resource on 4 June 2008
Ask yourself, why it took so long to get recognition. The answer is simple. The Bank know that the Union will bargain for better terms and condition / benefits. So, the Bank set lots of condition for example disagreed to include VP4 in ABBOA membership scope. Eventually, after 4 years of struggling, we managed to clear the first hurdle.
The next hurdle is the negotiation process. We took nearly four months to prepare the proposal. It is a very challenging task because this is our first Collective Agreement. But with the assistance from AMCO, Maybank, Kepak Muamalat and CIMB, we managed to submit our proposal to the Bank on 31 July 2008, one month after recognition
Unfortunately, they can't give 100% assistance. They encourage the Exco to learn and experience the process of negotiation. During the learning process, sometimes we are unaware about the consequences. For example, wearing protest badge. By right, the members should be wearing protest badge immediately after we declared deadlock . But the intention of wearing protest badge were made known to the Bank. They warned the Association on dress code and will not hesitate to take disciplinary action.
The objective of wearing protest badge is to expedite the negotiation process at Industrial Court. Since we have received the letter from Industrial Relation Department for a conciliation ( pendamaian ) on 23 July 2009, two months after we filed trade dispute to Industrial Relation Department on 26 May 2009, we decided to hold our intention until the appropriate time.
For your information, the following is what transpire between Bank and the Association during the conciliation :
The Bank
1. To continue with negotiation and not to refer at Industrial Court
2. Still no offer on rates of pay even 1%. Reason just completed salary adjustment exercise based on Towers Perrins recommendation.
3. Increment on performance based
4. To narrow down 25 deferred articles because costly to the Bank
ABBOA
1. Deadlock remain and insist to refer at Industrial Court.
2. Agree to continue if the Bank have new offer on Rates of Pay and Annual Increment
3. Based on ABBOA salary survey, only 5% affected .
4. Increment should be fixed and not variable income
5. The analysis by Towers Perrins are not at par with the industry.
At the end of the day, both parties stand to their proposal without compromising although ABBOA have more fact compared to Bank's representative. We strongly believe Industrial Relations Department is on our side.
What happen next? Industrial Relation Department will forward their report to Putrajaya to obtain Minister of Human Resource recommendation and to refer the collective agreement at the Industrial Court. The question is how long does it take? It is not in our control but the best we could do is to follow up with Putrajaya closely.
I hope the above explanation will satisfy your goodself. Please do not condemn the Exco unnecessary without evaluating their effort. They have sacrificed their energy, time and family for ABBOA. Please remember, ABBOA is an in-house Union and not a National Union such as NUBE and ABOM. They have full time staff to managed the Union whereas our Exco only participate in the Union after office hours, Saturday and Sunday.
Please act wisely and give your support to ABBOA. No matter how long it takes, but what is due to you will eventually be yours. We will update you from time to time.
Yours sincerely.
ABBOA President
