CALGARY – Shaw Communications today announced due to the “extraordinary and unpredictable conditions created by the Covid-19 pandemic,” it has been forced to temporarily furlough about 10% of its employees starting Thursday, April 16.
This is about 1,000 people and will largely come from those working in retail and sales roles across the company, says the announcement. Most Shaw and Freedom Mobile stores are currently closed due to the coronavirus crisis.
“Government leaders across the country have taken significant and necessary steps to ensure the health and safety of Canadians and to limit the spread of the virus. These measures have resulted in dramatic shortages or stoppages of work in specific areas of our business where we have had to make the hard decisions being announced today,” said Paul McAleese, president, in the press release.
“We value the hard work and expertise of all our employees in helping deliver connectivity to our customers across the country. Unfortunately, these changes are necessary until our business activities resume to more normal levels.
“With our gratitude, we will be providing financial support to affected employees beyond applicable government programs, and we look forward to welcoming them back when business conditions improve,” McAleese added.
At this time, the company statement says. Shaw is ineligible for any emergency government assistance programs and will use its own funds to top up government employment insurance payments at various levels, depending on employee earnings, and continue to extend benefits and pension contributions for eligible non-unionized employees during the temporary layoff period.
“These are challenging times, but everyone at Shaw and Freedom Mobile is well aware that millions of Canadians and their families depend on us to keep them connected. We take this job very seriously,” McAleese said in the release.
“We continue to see increased usage of our network and our customers continue to enjoy strong connectivity through our wireless and broadband services.
“We remain committed to supporting our customers with the products and services they need through digital, self-serve and self-install options to ensure they remain connected.”
Canadians can still order Freedom Mobile services from select dealer locations and national retail partners (more than 50% of corporate, dealer and national retail locations remain open) found at locations.freedommobile.ca. The company encourages customers to call ahead, though.
New or existing customers who want to order new or additional Shaw internet, home phone and video services can do so easily through shaw.ca/bundles/plans and benefit from self-install options.
