"The first company in the private sector" is an expression to introduce the establishment of Home & Service, a subsidiary of SK Broadband in July last year. SK Broadband moved forward "to employ the workers of suppliers directly", when the conversion of non-regular workers into full-time permanent workers has been strongly initiated in the public sector since the inauguration of President Moon Jae-in in May last year.
The National Assembly also released a welcome comment on it. It seemed that the overarching problem of indirect employment exposed by many cases of harmful effects caused by indirect employment in the cable industry finally had a silver lining. Since then, nine months have passed. People may wonder if their working conditions have been improved, since they now became the employees of a big company?
The Labor Today learned that "nothing has ever been improved." Workers all agree that wages went down, labor intensity has increased and work experiences were not taken into account.
A cable internet repair technician, only introduced with the surname of Cho(46) with the work experience of 16 years used to receive 1.48 million won(US$1,385) as basic pay and additional 100,000 won(US$94) as meal allowance per month when he worked for a supplier company to SK Broadband. Since the change of his direct employment to Home & Service, his first wage in August last year comprised 1.58 million won(US$1,479) as basic wage and additional 130,000 won(US$122) as meal allowance. It seemed that his wage had increased, but he came to know that the gross wage he got decreased by about 150,000 won(US$140), because Home & Service did not pay various allowances like overtime that the former supplier company had paid to him.
Workers also complain of "inappropriate work practices and increased additional work". Another cable internet repair technician with the surname of Kim(45) with the work experience of 10 years said that since his employment was changed to Home & Service, demands from the company have been pouring to maintain the service quality.
reported by Yang Ou-ram
translated by Kim Sung-jin