January 19, 2018, 09:58 / Business

Ex-managers of Bashneft asked Putin to help receive bonuses from Rosneft

Former managers of Bashneft sent a letter to President Vladimir Putin asking for help in receiving bonuses worth 2.7 billion rubles from Rosneft. This was reported by RBC with reference to a copy of the appeal; its authenticity was confirmed by one of the authors - the ex-director of the company's remuneration and personnel motivation department, Alexey Penno.

In 2016, 318 managers, from chief specialists to the president of Bashneft, became participants in the Long Term Incentive (LTI) program , under which they annually received large bonuses tied to performance indicators. These bonuses accounted for a third of the employee's annual income, the letter notes. Some managers were required to use half the bonus to purchase preferred shares of the company. The program was approved in 2015, when Bashneft belonged to the state.

According to the “staff retention mechanism” prescribed in LTI, when there is a change of ownership, no later than 30 days later, all program participants must receive the bonuses due in proportion to the time worked. On October 12, 2016, a controlling stake in Bashneft was acquired by Rosneft , as a result of which the managers had to pay bonuses of 2.2 billion rubles. and buy back their preferred shares for 0.5 billion rubles. However, Rosneft did not make the payments: the board of directors of Bashneft sent the provisions of the program for audit by March 1, 2017, and then decided to conduct a legal analysis by the end of June.

Participants in the program “understood the desire of the new management to understand the situation” and did not file claims, but non-payment of bonuses is a direct violation of the law, since bonuses were part of the salary, the delay of which is prohibited, the authors of the letter emphasize.

Pending the completion of the legal analysis, the Leninsky Court of Bashkiria declared the provisions of the program illegal, prohibiting the payment of bonuses. Former employees indicate that the lawsuit was filed by the republic's prosecutor at the request of Deputy Prime Minister of Bashkiria Evgeny Guryev, who was on the board of directors of Bashneft in 2015 and voted for the program. Managers complain that they were not notified of this trial. Later, they were unable to get the decision overturned on appeal and in individual lawsuits (the court had already rejected two employees).

According to Penno, the presidential administration forwarded the complaint to the Prosecutor General's Office. Rosneft told the publication that they consider the decision of the Bashkir court to be absolutely justified. According to a representative of the oil corporation, the motivation program “for top managers of Bashneft, including the president” provided for large additional bonuses not related to performance evaluation. These bonuses actually represented “golden parachutes” for the president and vice-presidents of the company, and did not apply to ordinary employees of the program, Rosneft points out. However, a letter from Bashneft employees states that less than 5% of the company’s top managers participated in the program.

Previously, ten vice-presidents of TNK-BP were suing Rosneft. Top managers demanded that the new owner terminate employment contracts and pay compensation in the amount of $8–$9 million. Several claims were satisfied with only small compensation awarded.