Kia seals tentative wage agreement Kia Motors has reached a tentative wage deal with its union by offering generous bonuses, ending a series of partial strikes that cost the South Korean carmaker Won1tn ($888m) in lost production. Union members will vote on Friday on the agreement, which is similar to that reached by Kia's parent Hyundai Motor with its workers. Under the provisional deal, Kia agreed to raise basic wages 5.3 per cent and offer bonuses equivalent to five months" salary plus Won9.6m per worker. Like Hyundai Motor, Kia also agreed to end overnight work starting in March. Ending night shifts - which was one of the most contentious issues in the four-month negotiations - will reduce Kia's working hours per employee by 11.7 per cent. The union agreed to compensate for the lost hours by improving productivity while the company plans to invest Won303.6bn to upgrade production facilities. Kia welcomed the provisional deal. "The management and the union agreed to focus on raising competitiveness for the company's continued growth," it said. Analysts were also upbeat. "It is positive news for Kia as union members are likely to accept the agreement and the workers will make up for lost production fairly quickly by working overtime," said Yoon Pil-joong, analyst at Samsung Securities. The agreement comes as a relief for Kia, which has suffered the resumption of industrial action this year after two years of no major strikes. Sales growth stalled in August because of the frequent work stoppages, with the company's domestic sales sinking 12.4 per cent. The partial strikes since mid-July have resulted in lost domestic production of 62,890 vehicles. The company has moved to offset flagging domestic sales with expanded overseas production, which was up 21.5 per cent in August from a year earlier. Kia expects labour union members to accept the tentative deal after their counterparts at Hyundai Motor accepted a wage pact last week. However, the Korean subsidiary of General Motors has yet to reach agreement with its union after workers rejected a provisional wages and benefits deal last month. The 15,000 unionised workers at GM Korea are undertaking partial strikes for four days this week. The labour issue has cast a shadow over Kia's recent strong performance. The carmaker notched a 9.4 per cent sales increase in the first eight months of the year despite the global economic slowdown and Europe's debt crisis. It has captured new customers on the strength of its cars" design after installing Peter Schreyer, formerly of Volkswagen and Audi, as its chief designer in 2006. Kia shares ended down 0.1 per cent at Won72,600 on Wednesday.