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Above inflation pay-rise for FT journalists, with bonuses for staff who have ‘deepened audience engagement’

By Dominic Ponsford

The Financial Times is giving all of its journalists above-inflation pay rises of around 2 per cent.

The Retail Prices Index inflation figure currently stands at 1.6 per cent.

The NUJ-brokered deal comes as the FT also promised to offer its editorial interns payments at the national minimum wage.

Currently, interns are only given expenses of up to £50 a week and then paid if they are with the FT for more than a month.

Managing editor James Lamont outlined the new pay deal in an email to staff in which he also noted that the FT has avoided job losses this year.

He said: “We are in a position to increase salaries from 1 April 2015. We are also in the fortunate position, unlike many of our competitors, not to be announcing the loss of jobs and redundancies at the beginning of the year.

“Many in our industry face an uncertain future – finding it difficult to find the right strategy and to sustain traditional markets let alone break into new ones. Many are caught uncomfortably between the old certainties of print and the new world of digital.

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“We have agreed a competitive above inflation pay offer to acknowledge the across-the-board effort many of you put in to make the past year a successful one.”

The pay deal is as follows:

  • An increase in editorial salaries of 2.2 per cent for those paid up to £65k for the calendar year. This translates to 2.93 per cent under the HR adjustment formula
     
  • An increase of 1.9 per cent for those paid between £65,001 and  £85k. This translates to 2.53 per cent
     
  • An increase of 1.75 per cent those paid more than £85,001. This translates to 2.33 per cent.

The HR adjustment formula compensates staff for a shift in the pay cycle moving from calendar year to financial year, meaning the current deal will stand until April 2016.

Lamont said: “The editor will make some merit awards in February, to be paid out in April. These will be targeted in large part, as last year, towards those who are making outstanding digital contributions, particularly to deepen audience engagement.”

The new deal for editorial interns will begin at some point in 2015.

Lamont said: “This would mean fewer opportunities for interns but in a more structured programme.”

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