Joining Amicus

Amicus, Britain's largest private sector trade union, was formed by the merger of MSF and AEEU on 1 January 2002. Subsequent mergers have made it the largest private sector union in the UK.

Reasons why you should join Amicus...

• better pay
• longer holidays
• safety in the workplace
• greater job security
• individual representation
• free legal advice
• safety in numbers
• membership benefits

Amicus, Britain's second largest trade union, was formed by the merger of MSF and AEEU on 1 January 2002. It is the UK's leading union for skilled and professional people, with members working in a wide range of industries and services, in the public and private sectors, in the UK and Ireland.

Nearly half our members work in manufacturing industry as engineers, scientists, technologists, technicians, supervisors, researchers and managers.

The other half - and growing - are professionals employed in areas such as universities, health, sales, finance.

There is a section for our sector here on the national Amicus website.

Anyone in the IT industry can join Amicus regardless of grade, job, contract type or length of service. AMICUS workplace reps and/or full-time Regional Officers provide members with advice and support and have access to an array of resources. Reps are trained in workplace issues and have a great deal of individual expertise and experience.

A membership form is available here, with the subs rates listed at the bottom of this page - less than £10 a month,

or:

And why join Amicus if you're in Fujitsu?

• the union negotiated the Security of Employment Agreement (SEA) which gives Fujitsu Services employees more rights in a redundancy situation.
• at MAN05 and Central Park, Amicus is already recognised by management to negotiate on behalf of staff. Only members get a say in these negotiations.
• as a result of having union recognition, we have Health & Safety reps at MAN05 and Central Park, with wide powers to inspect, investigate etc, as well as representing employees over Health &Safety matters (such as the impending relocation).
• collective organisation makes your job more secure. In the 2002 ICL redundancies, over 200 people were made redundant at MAN05, but only 7 Amicus members who wanted to stay were among that number.
• Amicus does a good job for its members - see the thanks from members during the redundancies.
• because Amicus has union recognition at MAN05 and Central Park, we have a right to reliable and up-to-date information from the company. Amicus also has members on the Fujitsu Services Consultative Forums.
• Amicus members are the best informed employees - we send out frequent newsletters.
• you have rights at work, but you need a union to assert them. For example, several key company policies are out of date, and no longer comply with the law. Would you know what your rights are? The company won't tell you.
• Management make better decisions if they know they'll have to justify them. A strong union helps ensure its members are treated fairly.

You will need Acrobat Reader to view this file. If you do not already have it installed then you can get it from the intranet or the internet.

NB: If you have any problems viewing/printing the form, you will need to upgrade your Acrobat Reader (to version 4 or greater) - use the links above. If you use the intranet link and you do not have administration permissions for your PC, you will get a few error messages - ignore them. The upgrade should work despite them.

People working at Fujitsu generally pay monthly by Direct Debit.

Every member chooses whether to be "Contracted In" or "Contracted Out". "In" means you pay into the union's "political fund" (allowing Amicus to use the money to lobby parliament, etc. when campaigning for peoples rights), and "Out" means you don't. Being contracted in only costs a few pence, and we encourage people to contribute - after all, employers use every means to lobby for their interests!

The subs rates below are the Contracted In rate - members who opt out of paying into the political fund will be excused the small amount that is the contribution.

If you wish to opt-out of the political levy, then a form (pdf format) is available here.

There are also reduced rates (paid annually) for retired members andstudents. There is also a reduced rate for low paid members (paid less than £210 gross/week - please contact us if you think this applies to you.

2008 subs rates (unchanged from 2007)

		Monthly Rate	Quarterly Rate	Half Yearly Rate	Annual Rate
Full Time (members aged 21 or over who normally work 20 hrs or more/week)		£9.95	£29.85	£59.70	£119.40
Part Time (members aged 21 or over who normally work less than 20 hrs/week)		£5.78	£17.34	£34.68	£69.36
Young (members aged under 21)		£4.98	£14.94	£29.88	£59.76
Training First Year (members in apprenticeships or full time occupational professional or government training schemes)		£2.21	£6.63	£13.26	£26.52
Training until training period is finished (members in apprenticeships or full time occupational professional or government training schemes)		£5.78	£17.34	£34.68	£69.36
Student (members in full-time higher or further education)					£10.00
Retired (permanently retired or permanently unable to work on medical grounds or excused contributions over 24 months and not working)					£10.00

The Political Fund is: weekly 13p and monthly 58p, annually £6.90 (retired members who are contracted out pay £3.10).

Union subs represent extraordinarily good value - the free legal representation alone recovers tens of millions of pounds a year for members - almost as much as the union's entire subs income. For an overview of membership benefits, see here.

Many members pay by Direct Debit or through payroll ("checkoff") and shouldn't need to take any action. Head office should directly contact anyone who needs to take action to increase their payments.

If you are leaving Fujitsu and want to know what you can do about your membership, see here for information.