4th May 2020LTB 241/20

Dear Colleagues,

BT Enterprise – Covid-19: Changes to SME Sales Bonus Plans

The CWU BT Enterprise and Global Services National Team have been made aware of changes to the SME Bonus Sales Plan in the light of the current Covid 19 emergency.

During April Branches will be aware that BT and EE paid bonus based on average monthly bonus paid in July – Dec (Q2 / Q3) including accelerators, agents were then paid on a pro rate basis on days worked in April. Broadly speaking this was welcomed by our members affected. During this period the vast majority of our members have now moved to home working where possible.

For May, BT is predicting greatly reduced inbound sales call volumes, and they have put in place the following arrangements for bonus.

In response to the reduced in-bound call, agents with the better sale conversion rates will be set new targets and will answer incoming calls to customers. This will account for approximately 75% of agents and they will work to new adjusted targets. The targets have been based on the most up to date call forecasts, recent actual figures and using current conversion rates. Agents will not be entitled to earn accelerators. This BT say, is to reflect the expectation that annual and quarterly forecast will not be met, let alone exceeded.

The quarter will be split into three separate months with May representing one third of the full normal quarterly OTB. Agents will start earning bonus at 85% of points per target area as per the normal payplan rules.

Other agents not selling but at work, will be paid as per the April payment arrangements but NOT including accelerators. These agents will be either assigned to “Enterprise Project Match” activity or asked to do OB calling from home to carry out customer account review/ soft sell activity.

The Union recognises that these are significant changes to the normal way of working and our priority is that member’s contractual rights are protected during these extremely extenuating circumstances. Whilst these arrangements will provide the ability for members to earn bonus or to earn equivalent to their average bonus, we want to proceed cautiously and to monitor the outcome of these changes. Therefore, we have arranged to review the results of these changes in two weeks’ time.

We would also ask branches with members affected by these changes to contact us directly at aeldred@cwu.org, if they have any enquiries concerning the contents of this LTB.

Yours sincerely,

Allan Eldred

Assistant Secretary

LTB 241/20