Days after the company downgraded the jobs of 289 employees, a number of Republic Bank customers' account balances have been affected by electronic glitches.

On Monday, the bank rolled out the results of a job evaluation exercise conducted in collaboration with the Banking, Insurance and General Workers Union (BIGWU).

The bank said the union requested the exercise as was agreed to in the collective agreement for June 2005 to May 2008.

At the end of the job evaluations, 50 jobs were upgraded, representing 347 employees.

Ninety-eight jobs were downgraded, representing 289 employees. All other jobs remained unchanged.

The downgraded jobs represent less than 20 per cent of the total number of jobs in the bank which employs 2,877 people in Trinidad and Tobago, the bank said in an exclusive statement to TV6 News yesterday. The compensation packages of the people whose jobs were downgraded were not affected and remain unchanged, the bank said, adding that they will suffer no loss of benefits as a result of the downgrade of their jobs.

Republic Bank managers met with their staff on Monday and shared the impact of the evaluation exercise with them.

On Wednesday, the bank said it experienced "technical challenges" on some customers' account balances through the electronic banking system only.

"Less than one per cent of accounts were affected," the bank stated, adding that the situation was resolved later Wednesday.

Sources familiar with the bank's operations said a number of IT staff members did not turn up for work earlier this week after the rollout of the job evaluations started.

But the bank said in its statement it could not "relate to any dissatisfaction being experienced by staff in relation to the job evaluation exercise".

Speaking to TV6 News after meeting with the bank's management on the matter yesterday BIGWU's vice president Mario Als confirmed the job upgrade and downgrade figures released by the bank and the union's participation in the evaluation exercise.

"There is a notion, and I think we need to dispel that notion, that when one is regraded, if a job is downgraded, that the incumbent would lose, that there would be a diminution of benefits, that is not going to happen. It is not going to happen and I think it is one of the fears that the workers have," Als said.

Als said the union will be meeting with its members in Republic Bank tomorrow at its headquarters at 1 p.m. to explain the situation to them. –See Page 10.

–additional reporting by Juhel Browne