Pam Magazine 16/13: Tongue-tied
Employers are dodging payment of the language skills supplement. Text in agreements that seems obvious has to be interpreted in court.
"I would really like to have that decision-maker come and stand at my till and listen to whether we can cope in Finnish when serving customers who ask for guidance, information, etc. in English. Just saying hello, thank you and goodbye is certainly not enough!"
This was the argument of a salesperson working for a chain owned by Kesko, in a discussion on PAM's network for members. According to this person, the employer's opinion is that working as a cashier is so simple that speaking Finnish is enough.
According to the collective agreement in the commercial sector, a language skills supplement is paid if the employee has to use more than one language in ordinary customer service. This provision seems exceptionally clear-cut. Now, employers have started to argue about what constitutes ordinary customer service.
There are a lot of Russian salespeople who also use Finnish all the time and Finnish salespeople who speak Russian in South-East Finland, especially in Lappeenranta and Imatra. According to union official Kristiina Eerola, both groups must be paid a language skills supplement. Most of the customers are Finnish and Russian.
– Some employers have demanded that staff prove their language skills with a demonstration test. This is not set out in the collective agreement, Eerola states.
Eerola thinks it would not be a bad idea to try serving customers in Finnish only, if the employer feels that is enough. That would then be a good reason to point out the language skills supplement when the employer starts to ask "could you use Russian since you speak it so well?"
Eerola also points out that decisions on not paying the language skills supplement cannot be chain-specific, because the need to use different languages varies from one region to the next.
Very soon, the Labour Court will issue a decision on the argument concerning language skills supplement for Seppälä employees in Lappeenranta: whether salespeople entitled to a pay supplement for using English. The court will interpret whether the criteria of ordinary customer service are fulfilled with regard to work done by Seppälä employees and whether the salespeople use the language often enough. The employer's opinion is that these criteria are not fulfilled in a "self-service shop".
Text:: Tiina Ritala