The strikes at the Commerzbank subsidiary ComTS may be a harbinger of a wave that several companies could face this fall.

In the ComTS companies, 1,600 employees without a collective agreement, often with remuneration close to the minimum wage, carry out administrative tasks such as mail processing, digitizing documents and processing loan collateral.

After two days of warning strikes, the Verdi union has now called on employees to go on strikes again in the next two weeks.

Commerzbank does not expect “the current strikes to cause any significant disruption to operations”, neither in the branches nor in the twelve new advice centers, as the bank’s spokeswoman told the FAZ.

Hanno Mussler

Editor in Business.

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However, even without a strike, Commerzbank can often only be reached by telephone after waiting times on the hotline of more than 30 minutes.

Branches are being closed, advice centers are being set up.

The latter should be operational in November.

Despite the impending recession and setbacks, especially in the Polish business, the Board of Management is steering Commerzbank towards a profit in the billions for 2022 and wants to pay a dividend in spring 2023 to the shareholders, who have almost always been left empty-handed since 2008.

In this respect, the work stoppages come at a sensitive time and appear quite capable of lending weight to the union's demands.

For ComTS employees, Verdi demands “regular and transparent salary increases, a 13th monthly salary, the abolition of on-demand employment contracts and an energy bonus” of twice 1500 euros for the current and the coming year to compensate for the current price increases in the energy sector.

The spokeswoman for Commerzbank rejected Verdi's accusation that the bank first held out the prospect of negotiations on a collective agreement for ComTS and then backed down from it.

Rather, the board is convinced that "the working conditions in our ComTS companies can be coordinated most effectively with our local works councils".

The Commerzbank spokeswoman countered Verdi's demands for higher salaries: In the past three years there have been "regular salary adjustments" that have been "at least comparable" to the salary increases in the banking industry.

In addition, holiday entitlements have been increased and annual holiday and Christmas bonuses have been introduced.

However, Verdi is not enough in view of the sharp rise in prices almost everywhere, especially for energy, and is calling for a collective agreement.

There is one for the approximately 25,000 employees of Commerzbank AG, but not for the employees in the outsourced management companies, who are often referred to as the "back office".