Shorter working hours and reduced flexitime are among concessions agreed by workers at KBA’s two main manufacturing plants in Germany.

A two-year agreement includes removal of hours from flexitime accounts without adjusting wages, as well as a reduction in the weekly regular working times with corresponding adjustments to wages and salary, the company says.

The further restructuring moves at the Würzburg and Radebeul plants are a response to the continuing “tense” situation in international printing press markets.

Growing submarkets, such as packaging and digital printing, oppose shrunken segments, such as publication and newspaper printing, KBA says.

In early 2009, the company began redistributing work between the plants, and capacity in core sheetfed and web offset has since been reduced by a quarter. The payroll has been cut from 8200 in 2007 to 6300, and is expected to go below 6000 with phased retirement schemes and other measures.

KBA says early realignments and its strong position in niche markets such as metal decorating, industrial coding and security printing, have enabled it to maintain positive pre-tax earnings since 2009.

New collective special regulations – agreed with representatives of employees and union IG Metall – came into operation at the start of January at Würzburg and Radebeul. They are meant to alleviate fluctuations in capacity utilisation and improve the profitability of the core business. KBA management also expects increased flexibility as a result.

In return, employees covered by the collective agreement have been guaranteed their jobs are safe until June 30 2015. KBA says its management board and non-tariff professional and managerial staff will also be subject to the savings to the same degree.