Fiat Chrysler sales numbers won't affect contract talks, Unifor says

Fiat Chrysler Automobiles revised sales figures won't impact contract negotiations, union officials and analysts say.

The automaker revealed on Tuesday that its streak of 75 straight months of sales gains should have ended in 2013, according to revised sales figures released by FCA.

The company is now changing the way it records monthly sales. Applying the new method retroactively to the start of 2011 shows the company overstated sales for 30 months, including three in which it would have reported a sales decline. The company also understated sales for 36 months.

Dino Chiodo, Unifor Local 44 president and chair of Unifor's master bargaining committee negotiating with FCA, said the new numbers won't affect the union's plan of attack later this summer.

Chiodo still called FCA "a company doing well on a regular basis."

"The reality is when you take into consideration that the sales streak stopped in 2013, there's still only been three months of negative sales over the course of an 80-month period," he said. "The reality is they're doing quite well."

Chiodo, who represents thousands of workers at the Windsor Assembly Plant, said despite the new sales figures, profits remain the same.

"Fiat Chrysler Automobiles has great product, it's selling well and we're excited about looking at what we can gain this round of bargaining," Chiodo said. "I think it's important for us to recognize that when company is doing well, workers should be able to share in a part of that."

University of Windsor auto analyst Tony Faria also said profits, not sales numbers, matter most when it comes to bargaining.

"I don't think this investigation will affect the union's position on increasing wages at all," he said. "FCA's finances were not altered and all three companies are making record profits, the workers will still want to share in that."

Just how they share in that is up for debate during contract talks, Faria said.

"It's not that the companies don't want to share their profits, it's just that they'd prefer to do it in profit-sharing at the end of the year, whereas the union's position is that they want it in guaranteed hourly wages," he said.