DETROIT (AP) -- Chrysler LLC is telling employees worldwide to take a mandatory two-week vacation in July.

Chrysler informed employees of the plan in an e-mail sent to employees that was obtained by The Associated Press. Chrysler spokeswoman Mary Beth Heilprin confirms the e-mail was sent.

Chrysler plans a corporate-wide shutdown the weeks of July 7 and July 14. Heilprin says some employees may be asked to stay on to work on special projects.

It's common for automakers to shut down plants in July, but this would also affect salaried workers.

Chrysler says the shutdown should help it boost productivity and efficiency. Heilprin didn't have any details about why the decision was made.

 

Yep, just got a MarketWatch bulletin on this one.

 

Well either they want everybody to get a good taste of "So this is what it's like to not have a job." or the just want everybody to take two weeks, have a great time and come back energized.

 

I actually think it's a great idea. Many businesses in Europe do this same thing each summer. Shut down and tell everyone to take a holiday. I'm sure they are coinciding this with the yearly change over on production lines as well as it's a slow time of year for them.

 

Uhh.... oh.... What is going on!???

 

I agree... Not sure what the big deal is.

 

Our company always shut down for two weeks in the summer so that we could do large maintenance projects without having the production people interupting us to use the overhead cranes and tractor service. We never thought it was a big deal. We don't do this anymore and big maintenance jobs are a pain to get accomplished. My sister works for a Honda parts supplier in Ohio and the Honda plant there shuts down for a week every year to do cleaning, maintenance, etc..

 

My job makes it pretty near impossible to take off any time from April-Sept. Meanwhile, our Dutch parent company takes the whole freaking summer off. I have 4 weeks and haven't been able to use it all for years. Of course, if you don't use it, you lose it....

 

GM has done this company-wide for many years. It's called shutdown break. Started because they factories needed time to change out the tooling to provide the new model's sheetmetal, etc. Eventually the engineering guys realized the factory hacks(term of endearment, please!) were getting time off in the summer (typically July), so they forced the issue and got the same deal. I do contract work for GM occasionally and when it is during shutdown, I get a break without pay.

Chrysler lost something like 1.6 Billion since Cerberus(three-headed dog that guards the gates of Hell) took over, they needed some slack in order to continue to build Jeeps. Not to be concerned...yet.

Also heard that Mahindra may buy the Jeep brand/organization from Chrysler

 

Already debunked awhile ago.