The agreement also provides the 15,000 clerical employees in Peninsular Malaysia a one month salary for their respective major festivals like Aidilfitri, Chinese New Year, Deepavali, Christmas and Vaisakhi.

Home
News
Banking employees get salary adjustment up to 18%, best ever collective agreement
Banking employees get salary adjustment up to 18%, best ever collective agreement
MCBA president Datuk Nora Abd Manaf (3rd from left) exchanging documents with NUBE president Michael Tan Eng Hong, flanked by (left to right) CIMB's Tay Shik Heng, Khairussaleh, Shamsul Iskandar, NUBE consultant Ragavan and Solomon.
Wednesday, April 12th, 2023 at News
by HABHAJAN SINGH / Pic by MUHD AMIN NAHARUL
Employees of commercial banks’ must be grinning ear to ear as their union signed a collective agreement (CA) that gave them what is probably the best ever combined perks, including a 15% to 18% salary adjustment.
The agreement also provides the 15,000 clerical employees in Peninsular Malaysia a one month salary for their respective major festivals like Aidilfitri, Chinese New Year, Deepavali, Christmas and Vaisakhi.
The salary adjustment is the highest in the recent history of the National Union of Bank Employees (NUBE), with the exception of a 22% increase in the 1990s.
The NUBE and the Malayan Commercial Banks’ Association (MCBA) signed the CA for 2021 to 2023 in Kuala Lumpur today.
The agreement, the 19th CA between NUBE and MCBA, contains more than 20 schemes and incentives, both financial and non-financial.
“This is the best collective agreement since I came on board in 2001,” NUBE secretary general J Solomon who represented the union in the signing ceremony.
MCBA was represented by its president Datuk Nora Abd Manaf who is also the group chief human capital officer of Malayan Banking Bhd (Maybank).
The event was witnessed by Datuk Seri Shamsul Iskandar Md Akin, the chief political secretary of Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim.
The conclusion of the agreement earlier this week came as a surprise to the union as negotiations seemed to have hit a roadblock towards the end-March, when the union wrote a letter to the Association of Banks In Malaysia (ABM) chairman Datuk Khairussaleh Ramli, who is also Maybank’s group president and CEO.
“It was good to get it settled before Hari Raya,” Khairussaleh, who was present at the signing ceremony, told The Malaysian Reserve.
The agreement includes a new clause on social dialogue, to be held every six months, to provide room for discussion to balance the banks’ future direction and the welfare of the union members.
The CA also provides for transfer allowance, a higher transport allowance, an increase of the zero percent housing loan quantum to RM300,000 from RM100,000, and a maternity leave of 98 days, up from 90 days.
It will also roll the RM600 cost of living adjustment (COLA) payment into the base salary, pushing the minimum salary higher.
With the COLA payment, the minimum salary for the three categories of staff will increase to RM2,370 for the non-clerical staff, RM2,670 for clerical staff and RM3,130 for the special grade clerical employees.
The maximum salary for the three categories will see an uplift to RM4,002, RM6,054 and RM7,110, respectively.
In her speech, Nora said the CA will ‘provide one of the meaningful revisions in terms of salaries and benefits’, with the management taking into cognisance the increase in the cost of living.
She said the new salary would see banking employees rank within the top tier of similar employees in the market.
All in, Nora said the agreement will see member banks ‘making an investment’ of nearly RM390 million for its clerical workforce, including RM65 million for the one-month festival payment, 90% of which will be paid out this month.
In the CA sealed in January 2019, banking employees received a salary adjustment of 12% to 16%, an additional annual increment for maximum salary, COLA payment of RM600, housing loan at 0% interest rate for the first RM100,000, religious leave for non-Muslims with more than 10 years of service and an extension of maternity leave additional for three months at half paid.
NUBE, the nation’s third-largest union, is now a much smaller outfit on the membership front compared to its early days. From a membership of 60,000 strong three decades ago, it shrank to about 40,000 in the early 1990s, and now down to about 15,000 members.
Source : https://themalaysianreserve.com/.../banking-employees.../