Standard Chartered Bank (StanChart) has requisitioned the services of consultancy major Lovelock & Lewes for its credit card division. The management is outsourcing from different agencies for various other activities as well.
Senior StanChart officials informed that the outside agencies will take care of the non-core operations, while the bank will concentrate on the crucial areas of activities.
"For example, in the credit card division, Lovelock & Lewes is doing the processing work, while the final selection of the card holders is being done by the bank officials," the officials explained. The whole idea is to outsource for non-core operations and keep the bank employees engaged in core activities.
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But this has evoked a strong resentment among the union members.
"We do not understand why the management has earmarked so many employees as surplus, when they are hiring outside agencies for various activities," said Tushar Das, general secretary, StanChart Bank Employees' Federation.
StanChart has introduced four voluntary retirement schemes over the years for reducing excess flab. Now the management is keen to complete the flab reduction exercise by reducing the remaining 200-odd surplus employees in the banking services division (BSD), which is a pool of surplus staff. The last VRS ended in March 1999, with a payout of Rs 167 crore.
The management has even come up with a training programme for counselling and upgrading the technical skill of the employees, which can benefit the staff in the long run. But, the officials pointed out, the employees refused to take up the training programme.
The tiff between the union and the management has gradually intensified as the employees claimed that they were caught off guard with the BSD staff being considered redundant.
"A letter from the chief executive officer had communicated to us that the BSD was to create productive and motivating opportunities for each one of our employees," Das said.
An overall reduction in staff strength has become a crucial survival strategy for StanChart. It has become necessary for the bank because of technological upgradation, business process re-engineering and centralisation of operations so as to render itself lean and efficient, the officials emphasised.