Wharf (Holdings) confirmed yesterday it would cut the salary of 570 employees in its head office and property divisions by five to 10 per cent next year.
In doing so, the company, which employs about 9,000 workers, becomes the first blue-chip firm in Hong Kong to adopt wide-scale wage reduction instead of redundancy as a means of keeping down costs.
The reduction affects about 35 per cent of the 1,580 staff in the departments. Company directors will take a 10 per cent cut, executives and managers 7.5 per cent and non-operational staff five per cent. 'The wage adjustment decision was a difficult one and this aims to minimise the impact on individual staff members by avoiding more drastic measures,' a spokeswoman said.
'We have considered the economic difficulties faced by general staff and that's why we chose a progressive pay cut.'
The 13th-month bonus remains unchanged.
Wharf, owned by Peter Woo Kwong-ching, joins Commercial Radio as the second commercial organisation this week to announce a salary cut. Commercial Radio announced a six to 12 per cent cut on Monday, the first since its establishment 42 years ago.
Cathay Pacific announced on Monday a 2.5 per cent pay increase but has cut its year-end bonus to 5,500 staff. The net result is a reduction in salary of about 5.4 per cent.
