"Golden handshakes"

A1 now extends social plan to salaried employees

In the past three to four years, the Group Management Board has already massively cut jobs in Austria and outsourced them to Bulgaria.(Bild: A1 Telekom Austria AG/APA-Fotoservice/Juhasz)

A1 Telekom Austria has apparently now extended its existing social plan for civil servants to include salaried employees. Up to 100 of them will be able to make use of the offer.

The approximately 3000 employees of the Telekom Group will be informed on Wednesday. Those leaving the company could therefore possibly expect a "golden handshake", reported the "Oberösterreichische Nachrichten" on Wednesday.

However, the company will only decide whether to offer "concrete termination agreements" with severance pay after an internal survey of interests. It is also unclear whether this action will be repeated.

The telecoms provider has recently cut around 300 to 400 jobs per year. On the one hand, this was done through the social plan, on the other hand through retirements and natural fluctuation as well as non-replacements.