Yesterday, Telefónica filed with the Ministry of Labor the documentation for the first employment regulation file (ERO) since 2013. It alludes to objective causes of a productive, organizational and technical nature to justify the cut. The measure may affect a maximum of 5,124 workers in Spain, a third of the workforce of the subsidiaries affected.

According to the information provided by the company to the unions, Telefónica suffers from a “functional surplus”, the result of the new technological environment. The most important excess, of 4,085 workers, is at Telefónica España, compared to 954 at Telefónica Móviles and 81 at Telefónica Soluciones de Informática i Comunicación.

The final number is equivalent to almost a third of the 16,500 workers registered in the agreement of related companies of these three subsidiaries. They are the main ones in the country, but if subsidiaries and non-contract staff are added, the workforce in Spain approaches 21,000 people.

In a statement, Telefónica explains that the aim of the plan is to “adapt” the various subsidiaries to the “demanding process of transformation and adaptation required by the new digital era”. The departures will take place over the period of the new strategic plan that was presented on November 8, which includes until 2026.

The unions explain that those affected by the ERO will be people born in 1968 or before, that is, older than 55 years, as long as they add up to more than 15 years of seniority.

Not all exits will necessarily be through the ERO. The company has not yet set the final number and has informed the unions that the reduction can be undertaken through other measures, such as the requalification and change of activity of the workers through upskilling or reskilling. Nor are other types of layoffs and internalizations ruled out, which is the opposite process to the outsourcing of functions.

The UGT responded yesterday to these approaches by making an agreement on the ERO subject to additional measures to the agreement that “protect guarantees and stability”. It will also defend “re-internalization of functions” and reskilling policies to ensure the employability of the workforce and moderate the impact of the process.

“We would like it to be like the previous exit processes: universal and voluntary, and for everyone to receive the money until retirement age,” explains the general secretary of CC.OO.’s telecommunications area, José Carlos Carbajo. The next meeting between the company and the workers will be on December 11.

This ERO is the first since José María Álvarez-Pallete presided over Telefónica. Between 1999 and 2013 the company resorted to this formula to reduce the workforce by 31,500 workers. Since 2016, instead, it has resorted to incentivized exit plans (PSI), and three of them have been applied to cut an additional 11,920 employees.

In October, Telefónica already announced that it would lighten the workforce following the closure next year of the copper business. The initial intention was to resort to another PSI, but the ERO ended up being chosen. Other European telcos, including BT, Vodafone and Telia, have also announced plans to cut jobs.