Citi's 'Voice of Employees' (VOE) program is apparently making its mark. And while many staff at other firms are worried about the little things, like keeping a roof over their heads and feeding the children, Citi employees, it seems, are concerned with more weighty matters - like broken fax machines and dirty fridges.

Detailed below is a recent e-mail sent to Citi's North America Markets staff, which sets out actions the firm is taking after collecting up a list of staff moans and groans.

'To: NA Markets

All,

As we have discussed, your VOE committee continues to make progress regarding the issues you raised in the VOE survey and follow up focus groups. This is the first of several emails that will note Action Taken.

Hope this helps.

Facilities

Pantries: Many of you noted the poor shape of our pantries across the trading floors at 390G and in the tower at 388G. At the request of the VOE Committee, the pantries were inspected and a full inventory done. You will notice that the pantries have been cleaned, and many of the out dated or malfunctioning equipment (microwaves, coffee makers, hot water dispensers etc) were repaired, replaced, or replacements ordered. Door handles and hinges were fixed, tile regrouted, rugs and refrigerators cleaned. Building maintenance has or will fix all of the ice machines.

We've also asked also building maintenance to step up cleaning of the refrigerators to a weekly schedule instead of monthly. But please note that means that you will need to clean your food out on a weekly basis. ...

Updating equipment: Over 30 broken fax machines were removed or replaced (most of us have moved to PC based desk top faxing) on the trading floors. No more running from machine to machine to figure which ones work and which don't. We were also able to save some money by shutting down numbers that have gone unused. Finally, we have added scanners in several places to accommodate the creation of a PDF from a hard copy document. Some are for individual group use and the PDFs are saved in a groups' drive but others are for everyone's use and will send the PDF to your inbox.

Progress. Your VOE at work'.

(Ed's Note - Faxes !? Do people really still use faxes ?)

Reader Comment

1. 'Why should the taxpayer have to pay to clean the fridges ? Can't the staff do it themselves ?'.

2. 'Firstly, TARP funding is not used for day-to-day operating expenses like cleaning. Secondly, it is obviously more cost efficient to use proper cleaners, rather than expensive bankers to sort out fridges!'.

3. 'Faxes are still used at Citi. They go well with the (far too many) antiquated IT systems'.

Source - The New York Times DealBook

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