Agreements in tourism almost achieve national coverage

By September 1998, the social partners in Austria's tourism industry had succeeded in concluding collective agreements for wage earners in eight of the country's nine provinces. Wage increases, at 1.8% over 1997 rates or 3.95% over 1996 rates, are moderate. Working time is now flexible in all nine provinces.

Having failed for the second year in a row to secure a national sectoral agreement for blue-collar workers in restaurants and hotels, the social partners in Austria's tourism industry again settled for province-by-province negotiations in 1998. In 1997, this strategy led to the conclusion of only four agreements. In 1998, there were early successes in three of the nine provinces, two of which had also concluded agreements in 1997 (AT9805186N). In July and August, agreements were concluded in another four provinces. The first was Salzburg (23 July: 14,300 workers) after noteworthy industrial activity, followed by Tyrol (28 July: 22,400), Styria (29 July: 13,700), and Carinthia (3 August: 9,500). All were backdated to 1 July 1998 and expire on 30 April 1999.

Since no agreements had been settled in any of these four provinces in 1997, wage increases had to make up for the year lost. Minimum full-time basic wages were raised to ATS 144,000 (Salzburg, Tyrol) or ATS 145,200 (Styria, Carinthia) a year. Guaranteed wages and apprentices' remuneration were raised by 3.95%. Guaranteed wages are the guaranteed component of income, independent of sales turnover. (The turnover component sets the percentage share in sales turnover that waiters will earn, and also fixes a guaranteed minimum to be paid when turnover falls below that minimum. This was fixed in the original framework agreement for the industry and has never been subject to negotiations - AT9705111F.)

Allowances for work clothes, foreign-language skills and night work were raised by ATS 10 to ATS 15 per month. If the working week is shortened to four consecutive days, normal daily working time may be 10 hours and maximum working time 12 hours. Upon agreement with the works council - or in the absence of a works council, by agreement in writing with the individual wage earner - normal working time can be increased up to 48 hours a week but has to average out to 40 hours over a 13-week reference period. In Tyrol and Salzburg, it was also agreed to try out a fixed-wage system until the end of 2000.

On 3 September, one other province, Upper Austria with 13,000 workers, followed with an agreement taking effect from 1 October. Having concluded an agreement in 1997 (AT9706120N) guaranteed wages were raised by only 1.8% and fixed wages by 1%. The minimum wage was raised to ATS 145,200 gross per annum. New working time rules had already been agreed in 1997.

1998 agreements now cover 95% of wage earners in the tourism industry. The one remaining province, Vorarlberg with 6,600 workers, signed an agreement in 1997. Here employers are offering wage increases of only 1.1%, while the Hotel, Restaurant and Personal Services Trade Union (Gewerkschaft Hotel, Gastgewerbe, Persönlicher Dienst, HGPD) is demanding 1.8%. Employers in the other provinces expressed fewer problems over wage demands, given the renewed optimism in the industry. They primarily wanted more working time flexibility without the penalty of overtime rates. HGPD distributed small "wage bags" over the summer containing two pieces of dry bread in a campaign entitled: "We demand some butter on our bread." A renewed effort to conclude a national collective agreement will be made in April 1999 to take effect from 1 May.