Dell Technologies has confirmed that it has temporarily frozen employee pay rises, retirement plan contributions and hiring across the business, as it looks to counter the financial impact of COVID-19.
Speaking to CRN, the IT infrastructure giant said the freeze on raises and external hiring will remain in place until the end of the fiscal year on 29 January 2021.
"Like all businesses right now, we're constantly evaluating our business to plan for resiliency in the current environment and to support our team members, customers and community in a way that sets us all up for success on the other side of this pandemic," Dell explained in a statement.
In a memo to employees, Dell COO Jeff Clarke said contributions to employees' 401(k) retirement plans will be discontinued for the rest of the fiscal year, while internal pay rises and promotions will also be halted.
A source familiar with the matter speaking to Bloomberg said the company has also suspended an incentive program, through which employees were able to exchange commendations from managers and colleagues into rewards such as gift cards and toys.
"While it's difficult to predict the shape of the slowdown and a recovery, our job is to prudently manage our business so that we're in a strong position on the other side of this situation," Clarke explained in the memo.
"Given the economic uncertainty that continues, we've made another tough decision to maintain the strength of our team and future of our company."
The move follows CEO Michael Dell’s agreement to take a pay cut during the coronavirus pandemic in a show of solidarity with the firm's 165,000-strong staff base.
Elsewhere, VMWare – which is majority-owned by Dell – also took similar measures earlier in the month, freezing staff salaries, contributions and delaying promotions, while executives and board members also took temporary pay cuts for the second and third fiscal quarters.
Other vendors such as HPE and IBM have also applied cost-cutting measures, with the former confirming that there will be redundancies and salary reductions between 1 July and 31 October. According to reports, IBM has already begun the process of laying off some members of its staff across the US.
