Unpaid public holidays and no paid parental leave: Microsoft and Lionbridge are Scrooge like companies

In December 2012, Henry Blodget wrote a post in Business Insider about the Scrooge Award he gave to Corporate America. Three years later, as Xmas is coming, Microsoft and Lionbridge jointly deserve a Scrooge Award for not providing paid public holidays to all their employees. As we are not paid during those public holidays we suffer a loss of income that takes a big part of the fun out of this period as we worry about how we are going to compensate for this $ loss. Could it be possible that Microsoft does not know its trusted Lionbridge supplier does not pay for public holidays? It is doubtful as Microsoft directly profits by not paying either for those public holidays. Yes, some suppliers are more human and do pay those days to their workers (like WIPRO does). As we noted in the previous post, Microsoft should require all its suppliers to provide paid public holidays as this is clearly mentioned in article 7 (d) of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights: "Rest, leisure and reasonable limitation of working hours and periodic holidays with pay, as well as remuneration for public holidays ", and Microsoft claims it is committed to implement this Convention. We'll keep denouncing this Scrooge-like behavior until it changes. Of course in these times of celebrating a nativity we'll add to our outrage the lack of any paid parental leave. The Universal Declaration of HumanRights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights also contain dispositions for pregnant moms. Article 25.2 of the UDHR states: "Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance". Article 10.2 of the Internal Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights states: "Special protection should be accorded to mothers during a reasonable period before and after childbirth. During such period working mothers should be accorded paid leave or leave with adequate social security benefits." 50 years later, as this Convention was adopted in 1966, these benefits are still not required by Microsoft for all tis suppliers. Although this Convention was never ratified by the US Senate, Microsoft voluntarily committed itself to implement all its content (as far as it was relevant to its responsibilities as a multinational corporation) when they joined the UN Global Compact in ... 2006.  9 years later Microsoft is still not respecting its commitment to implement dispositions adopted 50 years ago and implemented routinely in most industrialized countries, including by Microsoft's subsidiaries operating in those countries. Lionbridge Technologies does not give a damn about the UN Global Compact but their subsidiaries in other countries also have to respect those dispositions. Only in the US...

How Microsoft does not implement its proclaimed commitment to respect all the human rights in the Universal Declaration and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights

It's December 10 again, Human Rights Day again and this year Microsoft is still in violation of its commitment stated as follows:
"Since endorsing the UN Global Compact in 2006, Microsoft has had a formal commitment to respecting all of the human rights enumerated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights; International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights; International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights; and ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work. "
This year's Human Rights Day is devoted to the launch of a year-long campaign for the 50^th anniversary of the two International Covenants on Human Rights: the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which were adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on 16 December 1966. Let us look at article 7 (d) of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights: "Rest, leisure and reasonable limitation of working hours and periodic holidays with pay, as well as remuneration for public holidays "
 It is clear that paid leave should include periodic vacation AND the payment of the public holidays. When they announced their new requirement of 'at least 15 days of paid time off', Microsoft ignored the specific requirement by the UN texts that public holidays be paid, on top of the basic paid vacation. Requiring only 15 days of paid time off, without adding to this mandate the payment of the public holidays deprives full time supplier's employees of any payment when Microsoft closes its offices for ten public holidays during the year.
This distinction is clearly confirmed in the 1970 Convention on paid holidays: see article 3.3 and article 6.1
Ten unpaid public holidays represent millions of dollars that are not paid to thousands of Microsoft's suppliers employees, mostly employees that are paid the less. How long will it take for Microsoft to respect its commitment?

2015 Thanksgiving at Microsoft: the stinging bitterness of an unpaid holiday

I have been working full time as a tester/reviewer in the Windows App Certification Center since January 2012. Thanksgiving 2015 is coming. Microsoft gives two paid holidays to its ‘direct employees’ for Thanksgiving but we are employed via a supplier (Lionbridge Technologies) that does not offer any paid holiday.

In my case, this lack of paid holidays has saved Microsoft and Lionbridge a total of more than $7K during the last four years. Meanwhile my co-workers and I keep struggling from paycheck to paycheck and many are going to choose to come to the office the day after Thanksgiving not to lose another payday. Of course this Friday will not be paid overtime, just the regular $17 to $22 per hour, the same unchanged rates than 4 years ago.

Sign this petition on coworker.org

Microsoft: Stop paid leave discrimination

To: Microsoft

Campaign created by Philippe Boucher

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Extend paid holidays and paid parental leave policies to all Microsoft's supplier's employees.

Why is this important?

On March 26, Brad Smith, Microsoft Executive Vice President for Legal Affairs, announced that Microsoft would now require its suppliers to provide 'at least 15 days of paid time off' to their employees, as "paid time off matters".

On August 5, Kathleen Hogan, Executive Vice President, Human Resources, announced that Microsoft wanted to support its employees with benefits that matter the most to them: therefore Microsoft was adding two days to its present list of 8 paid holidays (MLK Day and President's Day) and extending its paid parental leave policy to 12 weeks. Unfortunately, those new benefits were not extended to the other half of Microsoft's workforce: the thousands of people who work full time for Microsoft via suppliers as many of the contractors don't provide any paid holidays nor any paid parental leave.

The direct, very negative consequences of this new policy will be a two day cut in pay, worth millions of dollars, for all the supplier's employees that are not being able to work on the two new unpaid holidays and the bitter confirmation that while Microsoft cares for its direct employees having parental leave they don't give a damn about the way their 2000 suppliers provide (or most often don't) any paid parental leave nor paid holidays. As the Department of Labor recently confirmed: the lack of paid leave disproportionally impacts low wage workers.

Were the savings made by Microsoft by adding two unpaid holidays planned to finance the new extended paid parental leave? Should the suppliers and their lowest paid workers take a pay cut to offset the cost of extended parental leave for the privileged better compensated employees?

While Brad Smith expressed in March a concern to reduce the inequality of treatment between employees, Kathleen Hogan's announcement is going in the exact opposite direction.

This shocking situation is made even more so by Microsoft's attempt to include Martin Luther King Jr within their corporate culture, as they finally add MLK Day to their list of paid holiday.

It took 30 years for Microsoft to recognize a holiday implemented as paid holiday since 1986 and the way it will work is going to penalize the lowest earners, the complete opposite of Martin Luther' King's vision!

At the end of her announcement, Kathleen Hogan writes: "We will continue to listen to employee feedback to establish benefits and build an overall employee experience that raises the bar in our industry, creates a more inclusive environment, and recognizes the importance of our people to the continued success of Microsoft."

Please sign this petition to let her know your concern about the lack of consideration Microsoft shows for all the people working via suppliers that are discriminated against and ask that Microsoft extend its new paid holidays and paid parental leave policies to all its suppliers employees, the other half of Microsoft