Auto shortages: 60% of dealers consider job cuts

Europe 1 with AFP 3:59 p.m., December 21, 2021

More than half of dealers (60%) are considering "job cuts from the first quarter", due to supply problems crippling the automotive sector, announced Tuesday the president of the National Council of Professions of the automobile (CNPA).

The estimate results from "tests we have just done with companies," said BFM Business Francis Bartholomé, at the head of the organization which brings together dealers, rental companies and garage owners.

To avoid these job cuts, the CNPA is asking the government to improve its support for partial unemployment.

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After a year 2020 weighed down by the Covid-19 pandemic, the automotive market had to face in 2021 a shortage of electronic chips.

Due to the explosion in delivery times, sales of new cars have fallen and are expected to be lower than those recorded in 2020. This phenomenon has repercussions at the end of the chain on a sector which employs 500,000 people, warned Mr. Bartholomé. .

In dealerships, salespeople are already penalized by these difficulties, their sales bonuses being awarded in some cases only to the delivery of vehicles.

"Many dealers have done what was necessary so that employees are not too penalized", assured Mr. Bartholomé, who evokes compensation.