The South African Commercial Catering and Allied Workers Union is prepared to mobilise staff and strike over proposed retrenchments.
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SACCAWU is preparing to oppose Pick n Pay’s proposed restructuring process, which it alleges could affect about 22,000 workers.
The dispute centres on Pick n Pay’s Section 189A consultation process involving store-based employees in its Non-Management Bargaining Unit, part of the retailer’s broader turnaround strategy aimed at improving competitiveness and operational efficiency. It started the consultation process last Monday.
The South African Commercial, Catering and Allied Workers Union today accused the retailer of attempting to bypass established engagement structures and said it was angered by media reports suggesting it had already entered negotiations over new employment terms.
“The S189A CCMA notices issued to employees effectively give them two undesirable choices, one is to accept retrenchments, or as an alternative to retrenchments, to accept the downward variation of their negotiated conditions of employment, which includes their agreement to cancel all their collective agreements on workers’ rights and protections,” the union said in a statement.
SACCAWU argued that the proposed restructuring threatened conditions negotiated over many years and warned it would oppose any attempt to unfairly vary employment terms or retrench workers.
Trade federation COSATU said it supported SACCAWU’s efforts to resist what it described as looming retrenchments of 22,000 staff and changes to negotiated worker benefits.
Pick n Pay, however, said the process was intended to review labour flexibility and employment structures that it believes are above current market norms and increasingly out of step with modern shopping patterns.
The retailer said the consultation process was not intended to permanently reduce overall job numbers, but rather to create a more sustainable and competitive store labour model aligned with customer shopping behaviour.
According to Pick n Pay, the review applies only to certain store-based employees and excludes support office staff and management structures.
CEO Sean Summers, who was brought out of retirement to turn the ailing retailer around, said it had already undertaken significant restructuring measures over the past two years, including changes to its holding structure, the Boxer listing, store closures, support office restructuring and salary freezes for support office staff.
“We must now address a critical reality that our current store labour model has been out of balance in the marketplace for some time. While established with positive intention, these structures have become increasingly complex, reducing flexibility and our ability to respond to retail trends and customer demands,” said Summers.
Summers added: “If we are to compete on an equal footing in an increasingly constrained marketplace, we can no longer sustain structures that are materially above market norms, especially while trying to return the business to profitability. Simply put, without change, this will put the business's future at risk.”
SACCAWU, meanwhile, argued that workers should not bear the burden of the retailer’s operational and financial challenges while executives and shareholders remained protected.
Among SACCAWU’s concerns, it said, is that Pick n Pay will reduce “working hours from 196 hours per month to 176 hours (this is equivalent to a R2000 reduction in wages per employee)”.
It also accused Pick n Pay of “doing away with transport for employees who work late shifts that fall outside normal public transport schedules, and those who work a night shift”.
Pick n Pay’s latest results for the 26 weeks to the end of last August indicate that its loss at group level before tax and capital items reduced 69.9% to R317 million when compared with a loss of R1.1 billion in the first half of 2025.
SACCAWU also criticised the retailer’s decision to refer the matter to the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration before tabling proposals through internal negotiating structures.
The union said it was prepared to mobilise organisational and legal mechanisms to defend workers and warned industrial action could follow if the dispute escalated further.
“If further provoked we are organisationally ready to mobilise and campaign to rally our members and communities to unleash industrial and mass action in defence of our members, their families, collective agreements, workers’ rights and our country’s economy from vultures seeking to devour human progress and developmental imperative aimed to deliver better life for workers,” said SACCAWU.
Yet, Summers said “our priority through this process is to protect jobs wherever possible while building a more sustainable business. Our goal is to ensure that Pick n Pay can grow again, open more stores and continue to provide work for people in the future.
"To achieve this, we must stay competitive, be financially viable, and serve our customers in the way they choose to shop.”
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