One salesman - married with two young kids - spoke of why they were locked out. There are six key issues: Use of hand held technology
2. Compulsory use of fact find
3. New reporting structure
4. New training methods for new products - pass competency tests - people will be trained up
5. Payroll admin - put it on direct debit
6. New focus on home service area.

A company spokesman also gave his side of the story: "New practices were introduced - none of which affect jobs or income. There are new responsibility and reporting guidelines, and we want to introduce hand held technologies, for the door to door cash premium collections." [that's the guys who go door to door, collecting payments and tyrying to sell more]

But the staff see it differently: "The company wants to bring in a lot of changes, with no discussion. Staff are on about £16 -18,000 (including commission), and often work unsociable hours. We often working as late as 10 pm, or weekends," says one sales rep.

1. Use of hand held technology. Using a palmtop computer to take details while going door to door, and installing modems in staff houses, so they can report to head office by email. Very futuristic.

"The company made a big deal that this was free. But it means extra work for us, and we won't be compensated. And before long we'll be having daily exhortations down the line."

A particular sore point is that staff were told they had to pay for laptop computers to use in work. All the sales staff bought them, paying about £1,700 for the privilege, and they are bitterly critical of the company for not buying the computers itself:

"They'd get tax breaks and everything. I don't think it costs them much to invest in new technology."

The company says that only a minority of staff bought the computers for their own use.

This isn't an issue in the dispute, but it has made staff cynical about mangements' good intentions.

2. Compulsory use of "Fact Find": Managers used to accompany sales reps to sales. Now the sales rep will do it on his own. They will also have to fill out very detailed forms about the customer "Fact Find", adding extra time for each sale. The company will be able to use the extra information to figure out what other products the customers might buy - then try to sell it to them. This is known as cross selling as is lucrative, but there is to be no extra compensation for the staff.

"Instead of one or two visits to close a sale, we now have to make two or three - without compensation," he says, pointing out for staff in the country, this will mean a lot more time chasing the same amount of commission.

3. New reporting structure: the company wants weekly performance reviews, which staff say will lead to massive extra pressure to sell. "It'll be constant pressure, pressure, pressure."

4. Training: "For years we have been saying we need more training on the products," say the staff. "Management shouldn't be making an issue of it." But he added that time taken in training means less time getting commissions and hence money. There is no plan by the company to compensate the staff for lost commission income due to training.

5. They are currently paid their basic wages every week, and get 13 4-weekly commission payments through the year. The company wants to amalgamate this into 12 monthly payments a year, again with no compensation. Staff point out that Ulster Bank staff got £2,000 lump sum for a similar payroll change: staff at St James' Hospital got an extra £6 a week. The weekly basic payment means they won't run out of money by the end of the month - so they have enough money to put petrol in the car to go out and keep making sales.

6. A new focus on the home service area: New jobs are to be created which will focus solely on the home service (door to door collection and new sales). But staff say that it is very badly paid: a basic of £7,000 a year, plus a small collecting fee:

"We will be under obligation to sell certain products - and if we don't we will be penalised. We have to sell extra products while we're calling for premiums."

"Nobody from inside the company has applied for the new jobs. They were advertised in a national newspaper and nationwide, a grand total of 40 applied for the jobs," say staff with considerable amusement.

"We think they'll try to force the older guys into these jobs," say staff. "They'll say: 'Well, you're not viable where you are, but you will be in this new job."
Staff are adopting a "softly, softly" approach. Pickets are being held between 10.00 and 4.30 - to avoid confrontation with staff going to work.

"We hope they see sense before it damages the company."

Staff point out that recent changes make things more awkward for people to pay their premiums: the closure of local branches means that people have to travel further to make their payments.

With policies in 130,000 homes, that's a lot of people affected.

Another thing that annoys staff is that there is no exit package at all, despite the sweeping changes that are being proposed, and the record profits that Irish life has made since privatisation.

Key managment staff pushing the changes are: Jean Wood, a scottish manager brought in on contract to implement the changes, Willie Holmes, the head honcho of the company, and Carl McDonagh, who told staff two years ago that he could not guarantee any job in two year's time.

The company's view is: "We have been negotiating with MSF for 15 months. The Labour Court last year agreed with us. There's about £1 million to be spread over 400 people."

"The staff rejected the Labour Court recommendations, and the 300 MSF members refused to implement changes. The rest are non-union or SIPTU and haven't actually considered the proposal as yet. Regarding the payment for computers, that was part of a longstanding agreement and is not at issue."

"We are not looking at replacing staff: We have not considered any further options as yet. We want agreement, this dispute has been going on for too long.