Firms cutting costs without affecting employees
By siliconindia   |   Tuesday, 23 December 2008, 17:31 IST   |    11 Comments
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Firms cutting costs without affecting employees
Mumbai: The retrenchment saga has unveiled the inventive side of the Indian firms with each of them designing innovative ways to cut cost without affecting the employees and clients. While some have put a halt on air conditioning, some have begun to resort to e-mails instead of posts. To cut on electricity bills Kotak Mahindra Bank introduced the 'Kill Bill' campaign under which the air-conditioners are set at a particular temperature and computer monitors are asked to be switched off when not in use. For the successful utilization of the campaign, posters elaborating the importance of it are stuck in conference rooms and at various entry and exit points of the company, as reported by Economic Times. Even State Bank of India (SBI) has begun using the e-mail instead of posts to reduce costs. The bank lures its customers to go for online transaction, by offering reward points to those who use the electronic system. Thus, through each customer, who agrees to follow the practice, the bank saves 40. Taking a cue from SBI, HDFC Securities too is looking at pruning costs sending a welcome kit for every new broking account through mail, instead of courier. Infact, the brokerage firm can make a monthly saving of six lakh rupees by following the practice. While other broking firms are relentlessly cutting costs by e-mailing contract notes with the consent of their clients, instead of printing and couriering it, which nearly saves 20 per contract. Typically, large brokerage houses like Sharekhan, Motilal Oswal and HDFC Securities dispatch a minimum of 5,000 such contracts on any trading day. Moreover, Sharekhan has reduced the print run of its research report by as much as 25 percent in an effort to cut costs. Another instance of innovative cost cut is by cutting on colored printouts, which is applied by a foreign investment bank, which used to take 1,000 colour printouts everyday, but has now brought it down to 100. This allows it to save 12 lakh annually.

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