Failing to pay overtime wages of at least 30,000 employees, Seven-Eleven promised to make up for it. (Image via www.asahi.com)

Seven-Eleven fails to pay the overtime of at least 30,000 employees for years

Alfonsus Adi Putra
Business & Industry
Retail & Food Services
Dec 11, 2019
1929
On Tuesday, Japan’s largest convenience store chain, Seven-Eleven Japan Co., apologized for failing to pay the overtime wages of at least 30,000 employees of its stores for years. The failure was caused by the miscalculation in the payroll system, discovered during a probe by Japan’s Labor Standards Inspection Office.

Nonetheless, Seven-Eleven did not make up for the payment nor publicize it at that time. Regarding the reason why it was not publicized at that time was also unknown despite an internal probe by the company that had been held, including hearings from the employees.

Seven-Eleven finally revealed the overdue overtime wage that went unpaid due to the miscalculation in the payroll system, amounting to at least ¥490 million. While the wages of the part-time workers are paid by the franchise store owner, the overtime wage and its calculations are done by the Seven-Eleven’s headquarters.

While the dubious equation used to calculate the wage has been used since 2001, the records for it were saved starting in 2012. It leads to an error that affected 8,129 stores throughout Japan, and as much as ¥2.8 million unpaid wages for one employee.

Seven-Eleven vowed to immediately reimburse all the unpaid wages for all the employees, including those who had resigned, although some records are missing, and some stores are already closed down.

This year is not being kind to the largest convenience store in Japan. Recently, Seven-Eleven received backlashes from its unwillingness to cut operation hours amid the labor crunch to unauthorized products at its stores.

Source: https://bit.ly/2PcpOdg

Business , Retail , Convenience-Store , Employment , Labor , Wage , Scandal , Asia , Japan , 7-11