No pay raise for many in SMIs

KUALA LUMPUR (Jan 9, 2013): Some 30% of small and medium industries (SMIs) in the country will not increase the salary of employees earning a basic pay of RM900 and above this year to minimise the impact of the minimum wage policy, which came into force on Jan 1, Sin Chew Daily reported yesterday.

Source from (The Sun Daily): http://www.thesundaily.my/news/584264
Published: January 10, 2013

It said 70% of these SMIs are in the manufacturing sector.

According to a survey conducted by SMI Association of Malaysia, for the rest of SMIs planning to increase the pay of their workers across the board, about 60% will only provide a small quantum of increase, i.e. 3-5%.

SMI Association of Malaysia president Teh Kee Sin told the daily the Minimum Wages Order 2012 has a tremendous impact on the labour-intensive manufacturing sector.

He said a pay revision would create a negative chain reaction, particularly during this time when business volume is low and overheads are high.

Given this scenario, about 30% of SMIs have decided not to revise the pay of workers who are already earning RM900 or more.

He said some companies have also decided to postpone the salary increment to the second half of the year for employees not affected by the Minimum Wages Order.

Teh said the survey showed that workers in the SMIs will see a smaller increase this time around compared with past years which registered an average of between 3% and 8%.

He said only 20% of the SMIs polled said they will provide a 5-10% increase while another 20% said the increase will be more than 10%.