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Helsinki - Banks across Finland were closed Monday as 30 000 bank employees walked off the job in a three-day nationwide strike over a salary dispute, union officials said.
The action was not expected to cause any major disruption to the general public as most Finns do their banking by internet and pay by credit or debit cards. Cash machines had also been stocked with more bills than usual in advance of the work stoppage.
"The strike action has no major effect on electronic services, but IT failures could lead to problems because they would not be fixed as quickly as normally," Kati Tommiska, a spokesperson for Finland's biggest bank Nordea told AFP.
"Many companies also paid their salaries ahead of time," she added.
The dispute concerns collective wage negotiations and working conditions for some 30 000 bank employees.
Financial institutes had offered their employees an overall pay increase of 0.69% over two years, which the Federation of Finnish Financial Services rejected last week.
"We have not yet had new negotiations. So it is not yet known when we will find a solution. But the strike is limited for now to three days," said Riitta Suonpaeae, the deputy chairperson of the bank worker's union Suora.
Finland's last bank strike was in 1990.
- AFP
