500 people are on the phone for Adm in Berlin in in- and outbound. They are dealing with calls for GASAG, Tele2... Most are students. The situation is characterised by "lousy conditions, nerve-wrecking controls and low wages" (quote from a leaflet). First 70 workers asked for paid holidays, which was denied by the management. Then, in April 2001, more than 80 workers were sacked. Some formed a "work group" and wrote a leaflet demanding for instance holiday payments and continued pay (in case of sickness). People from the initiative Callcenteroffensive also made a leaflet and handed it out in the call center. Some of the sacked went to court and got between 500 and 3000 DM. After the sackings and the actions the conditions got even worse. The controls at the entrance were intensified (using cameras...) and management paid more attention to punctuality, etc. It’s more than interesting that the union ver.di (result of the merger of most unions in the service industries) was already negotiating with the Adm-management about a collective agreement for Adm-workers. After the self-organised actions of the workers and the intervention of the Callcenteroffensive, the union wrote a letter to all workers arguing against "exaggerated actionism" which would "have a negative effect on the negotiations". Sure enough, whatever happens outside the control of ver.di is obviously unbearable!
Contakt: arbeitsgruppeADM@web.de
More at www.callcenteroffensive.de