Hyundai Output Losses Total $1.43 Billion as Korean Workers Refuse Weekends

Refusals by workers to man Saturday and Sunday shifts has cost Hyundai output of 79,000 vehicles worth 1.6 trillion won ($1.43 billion), a company spokesman tells WardsAuto.

This past weekend marked the 11^th straight since March 9 in which the workforce has refused weekend shifts.

Hyundai signed a deal with union representatives April 26 calling for increased pay for the Saturday-Sunday work, but employees voted down the pact.

Asked if the production losses were limiting Hyundai’s ability to fill export orders, particularly in the U.S. market, the spokesman says, “The production loss during weekends is not ideal and we hope the situation is resolved soon.”

Union rank-and-file workers have criticized their own negotiators, saying they rejected the April 26 deal because Hyundai was demanding a productivity increase in return for a small pay raise.

Workers are pushing union leaders to negotiate their weekend wage demands as part of the 2013 collective-bargaining sessions, which give the union legal strike-action leverage.

“They (the talks) have not yet started and the date is undecided at this time,” the spokesman says.

Kia is in the same situation as Hyundai, except at its Gwangju plant. Kia workers continue to refuse weekend shifts at the Hwaseong, Sohan and Seosan plants, but employees at Gwangju are working weekends when scheduled.

Kia declines to provide estimates of production losses incurred. Management is trying to resolve the matter with the union, but a spokesman declines comment on the meetings.

GM Korea’s workers union continues to discuss the weekend-wage situation in its current labor negotiations with management, a union source tells WardsAuto.

He notes the GM Korea Branch of the Korean Metal Workers Union released a scathing statement in response to General Motors CEO Dan Akerson raising the matter of worker overtime wages with Korea’s President Park Geun-hye at a roundtable business meeting in Washington this month.

“The GM chairman’s complaint to President Park and her response that the regular wages of Korean workers need looking into is having negative effects for all of the companies the (Korean Metal Workers) union represents at a time when critical labor talks are under way or are about to begin,” the source notes. “The union at GM Korea took (Akerson’s) comments to mean that the union is in for a hard time during the collective bargaining agreement negotiations.”