SWISS announces employee profit participation plan

Having established itself at a stable cruising altitude, SWISS is providing its personnel with a generous share of its bottom-line success. A new and forward-looking profit participation plan should ensure that employees benefit from the company’s profits with retroactive effect from July 2007. The new plan is supported by all the staff associations represented at the company.

After completing its corporate turnaround, SWISS has been posting black-ink results since 2006. The successful course has been maintained in 2007. And, as a result, the company is now in a position to make substantial investments in its aircraft fleet and product to further sharpen its long-term competitive edge. SWISS employees should receive part of the profits, too, with retroactive effect to July 1, 2007, under a forward-looking profit participation plan which is now being introduced. The amount paid out under the new plan will be linked to the EBIT margin achieved.

“All our employees have made a major contribution to our business success,” says Antonio Schulthess, Head of Human Resources at SWISS. “Our company is now in a position to invest well over a billion Swiss francs in renewing our aircraft fleet. And with our new profit participation plan, we will be ensuring that part of our profit goes to our personnel – as a firm element in our long-term personnel policy and as a result of the solid social partnership we enjoy with our staff associations.”

New plan supported by all staff associations

The new profit participation plan has been jointly devised and developed by the SWISS Management Board and the staff associations represented among the company’s workforce. The plan is intended to permit staff to share generously in the company’s profits without putting its competitiveness at risk. To place the present corporate success and thus the new profit participation plan on a sound and viable foundation, the Management Board and the staff associations have agreed to extend the present Collective Labour Agreements for a further two years. The new profit participation plan must also be approved by the memberships of the various staff associations.