OREANDA-NEWS. AvtoVAZ offers compensation in the amount of three average salaries of workers pension and retirement age, who fired by the parties agreement until April 3rd. The corresponding order was signed last week and it came into force yesterday.

According to the representative of AvtoVAZ, the order applies only workers of pre-retirement or retirement age, but in the document there are no such conditions. AvtoVAZ trade union supports the order, says its chairman Sergei Zaitsev, the document expands the range of employees and thus it is voluntary. Total AvtoVAZ has now 42,000 workers, wrote the newspaper "Vedomosti".

The order did not specify that the condition for the application is working pre-retirement or retirement age, so, the company seems to be insured against the risk of lawsuits, commented on the decision Senior Associate of Corporate Practice “Sameta”, Sergey Kazakov: people can complain about age discrimination. On the other hand, this approach gives the plant an opportunity, if necessary, to sign an agreement not only with retirees and employees approaching retirement age, but also with other applicants among the workers, he added. After all, they will not refuse to accept applications on the basis of age - in this case, too, it can be accused of discrimination, says Mr.Kazakov.

At the same time AvtoVAZ will not reduce workers in 2015, said the company representative. In 2015, a reduction will concern only managers, specialists and employees - their number is planned to be reduced by 1,100 people. Those who leave by mutual agreement from March 10 to April 15th, will receive four average salaries, from April 16 to May 15th - three. Last year, the countdown began with five salaries and programs operated up to three months. AvtoVAZ saves: a shorter period will optimize quickly the staff number, the cost will be less because of the amount of compensation, says the executive director of the agency "AUTOSTAT", Sergey Udalov.

In 2014, the number of employees of AvtoVAZ decreased by 20% to 52 thousand people. "We have reduced the workforce by 9,000 people, and office personnel – by 5,000 people - said earlier the president of AvtoVAZ, Bo Andersson. - We have reduced the cost by 4.2 billion Rubles. But when we fire people, we pay them benefits, which took 4.1 billion Rubles. Thus, the net effect [in 2014] was only 100 million. “Further optimization of the number will depend on the load of AvtoVAZ, but still the forecast is negative - the market is falling, says Mr.Udalov.