(MENAFN- Muscat Daily) A recent global report has said that Oman-based companies are projecting a 5.4 per cent salary hike among the highest in the GCC in the coming year. Another GCC state projecting a similar increase is Saudi Arabia.
The annual Global Salary Increase Survey 2014 by human resources solutions firm Aon Hewitt which compared data from over 500 companies across the Middle East puts the average projected salary hike across the GCC at 5.1 per cent. It is also expected that the actual hikes in 2015 will be closer to the projections unlike last year when they missed the mark by a small margin.
While Oman had predicted a 5.6 per cent hike for 2014 the actual was 5.3 per cent. Saudi Arabia had put it at six per cent last year the actuals were 5.2 per cent. This year's GCC-wide average of 5.1 per cent is slightly down from the 2014 (5.5 per cent) and 2013 (5.4 per cent) forecasts indicating that companies across the region are being a little more conservative with their budgets. However employees were given an average hike of 4.9 per cent only slightly below the original projection.
A statement by Robert Richter compensat ion survey manager Aon Hewitt Middle East said: 'The latest figures show that corporates continue to have confidence in the 2015 economic outlook despite the slightly lower predictions made for the year ahead. It is normal procedure for companies to rethink their salary projections on an annual basis and the latest figure shouldn't be a cause for concern for employees.
'Final budgets will be determined by HR and the management teams of a company and the numbers we receive are the projections made by HR only; it seems this year HR will be more in line with the final numbers.'
Bahrain gave the lowest salary increase projection for 2015 (4.5 per cent) followed by UAE (4.8 per cent) Qatar (5.2 per cent) and Kuwait (5.3 per cent). Meanwhile the research firm Capital Economics quoting the National Centre for Statistics and Information said that inflation in Oman remained subdued in the first quarter of 2014 despite a rise in consumer spending.
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