Caixa placed a server with a salary of R$ 45 thousand to organize a queue at an agency

Dozens of Caixa Econômica Federal employees who have reached the top of their careers are working in bank branches or underused. As a result of the distortion, the Sheet found ex-directors with salaries of up to R$45,000 sharing the same functions with employees who have just joined the bank who earn around R$3,000.

The case is being investigated by the MPT (Ministry of Labor). In a document sent to the agency, Caixa states that, in Brasília alone, 123 employees were transferred from the head office to bank branches in an interval of 90 days between the end of 2020 and the beginning of 2021.

Union entities that represent bank employees contest the company and say that the contingent of transferred employees is greater. In February, the survey was extended for another year.

As the servers held the previous positions for more than ten years, they incorporated the highest salaries, even now performing other activities. In many cases, Caixa also invested in the training of currently underused employees by funding courses and certifications.

The officials heard privately by the Sheet claim that they were the target of retaliation for having held high positions in the PT governments or for having had friction with the management of the former president of the institution Pedro Guimarães. He left office on June 29 after allegations of sexual harassment.

The National Confederation of Workers in the Financial Branch and the National Federation of Employees Associations of Caixa Econômica Federal pointed out to the MPT that the transfers were made abruptly, with “discriminatory criteria” and a lack of transparency.

The union associations also say that, in some cases, the moves made by the bank wanted to force older employees to leave the company through the voluntary termination program.

In a note, Caixa said that “it carries out the internal movement of its employees according to the legislation in force and observing the strategic needs of the bank”. The company stated that it is the largest financial institution in the country in terms of number of clients and that the good results are a reflection of the work of its 250,000 employees, including 87,000 employees.

The company also stated that there are internal investigations in progress, that the Board of Directors decided to hire an external and independent company to verify all cases and that the whistleblower channel is managed by an external entity, which is responsible for preserving the identity of whistleblowers. .

​An employee who has been with Caixa for over 30 years and has reached the position of executive director works today in a bank branch serving the public — an activity he performed in 1989, when he joined the company. He declined to be identified for fear of retaliation. Even in the lowest position of the agency, the employee earns about R$ 38 thousand per month.

According to him, his job today is to serve publics such as Auxílio Brasil and FGTS, create passwords and register beneficiaries’ cell phones. He claims that these are typical early-career roles and that his current job does not justify the salary.

The server says that he took several courses and certifications paid for by Caixa, in addition to a postgraduate degree in the area in which he worked.

He also says that, in previous governments, former leaders were used in ministries or in Caixa itself in superintendencies. For him, in the administration of Jair Bolsonaro, those who participated in another government are being humiliated.

Retaliation is not limited to officials who have risen to the highest positions in past governments. THE Sheet also located a former national superintendent of Caixa who was transferred to a bank branch after a series of clashes with Pedro Guimarães. Allocated in customer service, with a six-hour workday, the former manager receives around R$45,000 per month.

In a statement sent to the MPT in January last year, Caixa claimed that the movement of employees was “a strategic decision” that had the “objective of strengthening teams and supporting service in the business network.”

“The action sought as a result: to make Caixa an even more profitable, more efficient and more strategic company; increase Caixa’s share in the retail and wholesale segments; support in business activities; areas of the matrix centered on the performance of strategies and guidelines; rationalization of processes; greater agility”, says part of the letter.

Another employee who asked not to be identified joined the bank in 2000, was a national manager and claims that she is currently underused in a role incompatible with her current salary, of approximately R$30,000. Even with the experience required in the internal selection processes, she says that, since the beginning of the Jair Bolsonaro (PL) government, she has never been able to relocate to the company.

According to her, the first reaction was to start looking for a series of internal selection processes and try to relocate, willing to live anywhere in Brazil. She claims that she took courses and postgraduate courses paid for by Caixa in the past, and that in recent attempts at repositioning she scored well throughout the process, but was eliminated at the interview stage.

Relegation is illogical, irrational and unmeritocratic, says FGV professor

Professor and researcher at the Brazilian School of Public and Business Administration at FGV (Fundação Getúlio Vargas) Marco Tulio Zanini believes that the downgrade is illogical, irrational and anti-meritocratic.

For him, the company wastes public resources invested in training the server and generates demotivation among all employees, which translates into other problems, such as loss of efficiency.

“It is a huge disqualification of employees who certainly have experiences and had incentives to occupy higher positions. There are losses in two dimensions. First, because you are underusing a human resource and second because this generates dissatisfaction not only for them, but for all the people around him.”

Zanini also states that there is a difference between positions of trust – which also exist in the structure of ministries – and positions that are within the career plan of a bank.

“If I took and passed Caixa Econômica’s public tender, I have an expectation of where I can be in 10, 15 years. There is a career plan and there is consistency in the career progression of employees who are in the bank, regardless of political orientation of the presidency.”