Vodafone Axes Spanish Jobs & Closes Retail Outlets

In a major restructuring of its Spanish operation, the UK telecomunications giant, Vodafone, has announced plans to close all its 34 retail stores and lay off their 237 staff.

In addition the company has announced related staff redundancies that could see as many as 509 workers or 12% of the workforce gone by March 2022.

The company´s franchise retail arm will remain for the forseeable future though that too is likely to change as consumer behaviour moves more online.

A Vodafone spokesperson at their Madrid headquarters said that. ” for some years now, intense price competition and the drift towards low-value fees in Spain has led to a sharp fall in revenues and a significant margin deterioration”.

Redundancies will affect workers in Madrid, Barcelona, ​​Bilbao, Seville, Malaga, Granada, Córdoba and Mallorca.

In talks with trade unions the proposals will see redundancy packages of 33 days per year worked with a limit of 24 months and early retirement for those over 56.

The UGT union described the offer as “cheap.”

The Spanish telecommunications job market has contracted by around 50% with many of those losses due to digitalising of the sector since 2000.

Vodafone Spain was founded in 2000 with the aquistion of Spanish mobile operator Airtel.

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