Sega Accused Of Unfair Labor Practices For Alleged Plans To Lay Off Employees

Sega is facing some potential legal trouble following a complaint filed by the Communications Workers of America (CWA). As some may remember, workers at Sega voted to unionize and formed the Allied Employees Guild Improving Sega, or AEGIS-CWA, under the CWA back in April.

Recently, since September, Sega has been in negotiations with the group. According to the complaint filed by the CWA, the most recent move in those negotiations was a proposal presented to them by Sega on November 6 to phase out all temporary employees and move their work to offices in Europe and Japan. This would all be done by February of next year.

The employees that would be laid off under this constitute 40% of the AEGIS’ bargaining unit. Not surprisingly, they’re mostly game QA and localization staff.

The CWA states this movie is a “case of bad faith bargaining”, as Sega elected to drop the news in a meeting instead of bargaining with the union as they should have. As a result, the organization has filed an Unfair Labor Practice charge, calling out the company’s “direct dealing with [union] members”.

The complaint will go before the National Labor Relations Board, but as Kotaku notes, it may not be resolved before the layoffs occur.