The Sheer Absurdity of the EPO's Career System Explained by EPO Staff
THE staff union of the EPO in German and Dutch territories has apparently sued to challenge an injustice which persists under António Campinos's wing.
Foolish Campinos, who is evidently not qualified for the role he holds, was quoted as saying: "If a job applicant has 5 y of experience, he/she should rather work 1 more year outside the EPO to be placed 1 grade higher when starting service."
Campinos hadn't even worked at the EPO (or with patents) before he was parachuted onto the top role at the EPO.
He had also said: "Until you have proven that the career system doesn’t work, I won’t change it."
They are talking about the New Career System (NCS), which was mentioned here before (many times in fact).
The following recent message said that "if you were to quit today and be recruited again on the spot, you would be taken on at a higher grade."
This isn't even the worst aspect, but this is what they wrote:
Challenge lack of promotion - Professional experience should be better valued by the career system
Dear members, dear colleagues,
Some of you might be in the following odd situation: considering your experience prior to being recruited at the EPO and your experience inside the Office today, if you were to quit today and be recruited again on the spot, you would be taken on at a higher grade.
This is one of the many hiccups of the career system, and it is due to the uneven recognition of past experience in multiples of 6 years (see Circular 364 in Annex 1 below) combined with generally slow career progression inside the EPO.
Staff representation has previously pointed this out to management, and the career system has been the reason for several industrial actions and litigation cases initiated by SUEPO. This has led to the improvements on the recognition of PhD experience and a number of individual cases being won by staff at the internal appeal stage.
We now propose to challenge the problem mentioned above.
If you fulfil all the criteria below simultaneously:
you were recruited in February, March, April or May 20xx;
you have X years of professional experience before having been recruited at the EPO (disregard number of months on top of the number of years);
In Feb, March, April, or May 2024, you had exactly Y years of professional experience (i.e. anniversary of recruitment) within the EPO;
In case you are in JG4:
X+Y = 6 years and you are in G7
X+Y = 12 years and you are in G7 or G8
X+Y = 18 years and you are in G7 or G8 or G9
In case you are in JG5:
X+Y = 6 years and you are in G7
X+Y = 11 years and you are in G7 or G8
In case you are in JG6
X+Y = 6 years and you are in G2
X+Y = 11 years and you are in G2 or G3
X+Y = 16 years and you are in G2 or G3 or G4
Over time the (real) salaries at the EPO go down as lesser skilled people are recruited (if any!) and they don't catch up with inflation rates.
One veiled goal at the EPO is to grant loads of fake patents to fake "productivity". █