Vodafone has scrapped pay rises for all UK staff this year, just weeks after it confirmed hundreds of job losses.
The mobile phone giant revealed it would axe pay rises and bonuses for all 10,000 UK staff in a bid to trim £1bn off costs, despite announcing it was on course to post profits of nearly £12bn for the year to March.
In February Vodafone announced plans to cut 500 jobs in the UK, including HR roles.
Guy Lawrence, chief executive of the firm’s UK business, justified the company’s decision in a confidential e-mail to all UK staff.
“If we had agreed to a salary rise it would have forced us to increase the number of redundancies in the recent announcement,” he said. He added the pay freeze was a “tough decision to make, but a responsible one”.
An anonymous Vodafone employee told The Independent: “The management has totally shafted us. Morale is at rock bottom after this. Staff who have worked like hell this year to make sure the company can post huge profits have been stabbed in the back. If we foot-soldiers are being told that we have to forego any bonuses and salary increases then I hope the board is doing the same.”
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A spokesman for Vodafone said: “We can confirm that there will be no increase in salaries for staff at Vodafone UK for the coming year and that includes the management.”
