Flipkart delays new recruits' joining by 6 months; IIM-A fumes

Facing flak for postponing the joining dates of students hired from IITs and IIMs, Flipkart has offered Rs 1.5 lakh as an additional joining bonus to all campus recruits to ease their "financial burden" in case they are to pay back loans.

The Bengaluru-based company has cited restructuring of its businesses as the reason behind the deferring of joining dates for campus recruits from June this year to December. However, it did not disclose the number of campus offers made this year.

There are, however, reports that suggest the move to defer the joining of recruits comes as a part of Flipkart's efforts to cut costs amid funding crunch and falling valuations.

"As we work on redesigning this programme, we have taken a decision to postpone the joining of new recruits by a few months. Instead of June 2016, the new recruits will now be part of the improved campus program in December 2016," Flipkart has said in a blogpost.

"Flipkart will also pay an additional joining bonus of Rs 1.5 lakh to all campus recruits," it added. IIM-Ahmedabad has written to Flipkart co-founder Binny Bansal on the issue, saying the students felt cheated for no fault of theirs for choosing the company over other brands and will suffer as they have to re-pay their education loans.

In response, Flipkart said while it was a "difficult decision" to take but "it is important for us to land our campus hires into Flipkart at the right time and into meaningful roles which give them opportunity to learn and grow".

It further said the company is committed and confident to bring on-board the campus hires in December and that revised offer letters with updated joining date will be shared in the coming few weeks.

Flipkart, which competes with the likes of Snapdeal and Amazon, said the decision to pay the joining bonus was taken keeping in mind that many students have to repay their education loans. Loan repayment starts a year after the end of studies or six months after the student gets a job, whichever is earlier.

"Candidates can seek an extension on this period by submitting their revised offer letters to the bank... Further, the decision to award campus recruits the specified additional joining bonus is also intended to ease their financial burden," the blog said.

Flipkart said it has been working on restructuring its businesses to strike the right balance among key levers such as innovation, strategic execution and operational excellence.

"As a part of this ongoing restructuring, the campus programme will also go through a comprehensive overhaul to ensure that it is in line with our new business structure and that our campus recruits start working towards larger company goals from day one," it said.