Standard Chartered Bank sit-in continues<\/p>\n
JAKARTA (JP): Hundreds of sales promotion workers for Standard
\nChartered Visa credit cards continued a sit-in protest for the
\nthird consecutive day yesterday, asking for commission they say
\nis owned to them by Standard Chartered Bank.<\/p>\n
The protesters, part of the 2,300 employees of private sales
\npromotion company Jet 2000, gathered on the ground floor of the
\nStandard Chartered Bank headquarters on Jl. Sudirman in Central
\nJakarta and remained there until late in the evening.<\/p>\n
The workers called on the bank to pay their commission fees
\ntotaling hundreds of millions rupiahs for about 120,000 customer
\napplication forms they have collected over the past month.<\/p>\n
A spokeswoman for Standard Chartered Bank said yesterday that
\nthe payment to cover the commissions for the sales workers,
\ntotaling Rp 300 million (US$131,868), was made to Jet 2000 on
\nNov. 9 through the firm's account with the bank.<\/p>\n
\"We have nothing to do with the card promotion
\nrepresentatives. It is Jet 2000 that is directly responsible for
\nthe payment,\" Rina Jamal told The Jakarta Post and Kompas
\nyesterday evening.<\/p>\n
Standard Chartered has a deal with Jet 2000 only, she said.<\/p>\n
Jet 2000 Director Sambas Effendi appeared for the first time
\nyesterday to meet with five representatives of the protesters the
\noffices of Standard Chartered.<\/p>\n
A number of police officers were seen on guard in front of the
\nmeeting room.<\/p>\n
The meeting was expected to last until midnight.<\/p>\n
The protesters told the Post that they had contracts with the
\nbank which stated that would receive payment 21 working days
\nafter the application forms had been processed.<\/p>\n
They said the contracts state that the card promotion workers
\nwill be paid Rp 500 (U.S. cents 22) for each application form
\ncollected and a further Rp 25,000 (US$11) if the application is
\napproved.<\/p>\n
The bank had told the protesters before that only 2,825 of a
\ntotal of about 120,000 applications had been approved.<\/p>\n
One protester said she was skeptical about the bank's claim to
\nhave transferred the money to Jet 2000.<\/p>\n
\"Why did the bank transfer Rp 300 million to Jet 2000? It
\nsounds silly, since the amount includes the payment for the
\nunprocessed documents,\" said the protester.<\/p>\n
Other protesters urged Sambas, their employer, to clarify the
\nsituation.<\/p>\n
\"All we need is our commission, which is our right,\" said
\nanother protester.<\/p>\n
Most of the workers said that they had spent between Rp
\n300,000 and Rp 450,000 to find customers for Standard Chartered
\nVisa credit cards.<\/p>\n
\"I've spent Rp 300,000 to collect 400 customers during the 45
\ndays working as sales for the credit cards,\" said one protester.
\n\"But I haven't been paid anything for the work.\"<\/p>\n
The workers said that they have been paying transportation
\ncosts and daily meal expenses with their own money since the
\nsales promotion campaign for the credit cards was launched on
\nOct. 2. (bsr)<\/p>",
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