This will be the third layoff in a month done by different business giants that belong to dissimilar sectors. General Motor’s Venezuelan factory sent a text message to its 2,700 employees that they are now no longer engaged with the company. Two employees said that the company has paid off their dues directly in their bank accounts.
The Venezuelan court, a week ago, passed an ordered to seize the GM’s Valencia facility. The judgment went in the favor of two merchants who had filed a suit in 2000 on the grounds that said the company failed to meet the terms that were agreed.
Laborers say that before the seizure was reported, GM had been disassembling the plant, which has not manufactured a single car since the start of 2016 owing to the lack of parts supply and strict monetary controls in the OPEC country. The seizure, which GM called “unlawful,” comes in the midst of an extending financial and social emergency and instability in Venezuela that has officially bothered numerous U.S. organizations.
“We got payment and an instant message,” said an employee who had worked for the GM for over 10 years, including that his corporate email account was also deactivated throughout the week.
The company didn’t respond to this surprising bulk layoff immediately while dismantling the plants. Later, in last week, the company halted the operations and paid the workers due to “illegal seizure of its property”.
Looking into the past, General Motors isn’t the first company to fire its employees by texting a message. Clorox also followed the same technique when it declared its exit from the country. Later, the plant was taken over by the workers.
Shutting of the GM plant came after the fall in Venezuela’s production rate that was 8 cars a day in 2016.
The union spokespersons said, “They were unaware of the layoff and had no official information of the company’s decision. Employees did receive the amount but what they received was too low”.
The leftist government has approached GM to comeback but looking at the situation it seems that company had already made its mind, which resulted into the consequences.