Employees of convenience stores such as Oxxo and 7-Eleven should earn as much as bank tellers because they do similar jobs, according to a ruling party lawmaker.

Alejandro Carvajal Hidalgo, a deputy with the Morena party, told a press conference Monday that he is backing a bill that proposes that employees of convenience stores as well as customer service staff of pharmacies and retail chains such as Sanborns, Suburbia and Coppel be paid the same as tellers.

The lawmaker said that tellers earn an average of 14,000 pesos (US $670) per month, which he said was about 300% higher than the monthly salaries of convenience store workers.

But employees of stores such as Oxxo carry out similar duties to tellers because they take bank deposits from customers, provide cash withdrawals and process a range of different payments Carvajal said.

Given that such employees “carry out hundreds of thousands of bank operations” they should receive the same remuneration as bank tellers, he said.

The lawmaker, a member of the social security committee of the lower house of Congress, noted that in addition to providing bank-like services, employees of convenience stores, pharmacies and retail chains also charge customers for their purchases and carry out maintenance tasks.

Therefore they have three different roles but still receive salaries and benefits well below those of bank tellers, he said.

Carrying out basic bank transactions such as deposits and transfers is common at convenience stores, especially Oxxo, the nation’s most ubiquitous chain.

According to the National Banking and Securities Commission, Oxxo offers basic banking services at 20,962 locations across Mexico and 43% of all transactions are completed at its stores.

By contrast, commercial banks have fewer than 13,000 branches across the country and there are none in some rural municipalities.

Source: Merca 2.0 (sp)