6:54 am, April 7, 2023
Online-only used car dealer Cinch has announced a swathe of redundancies as it looks to shed six per cent of its workforce.
Consultations on the proposals have started this week after staff were told the headcount would need to be reduced.
Staff in the firm’s technology division were told yesterday (Thursday, April 6) that their jobs were at risk.
News of the meeting was leaked to Car Dealer and Cinch has confirmed it will be looking to cut its headcount.
A staff member told Car Dealer: ‘Cinch have started a consultation on redundancies in their technology function which includes lots of engineering managers and delivery managers.
‘Most of the staff are based in Manchester but a lot of those people are based remotely too.
‘Cinch had a reorganisation back in November with no redundancies needed because of a high rate of attrition. There’s lots of dissatisfaction right now.’
The source said the consultations are likely to result in a net loss of around 60 jobs.
In its last set of published accounts (April 2022), Cinch said it had 295 employees, up from 94 at the end of April 2021. Its highest-paid director received £215k including pension contributions.
‘Some new roles have been created and there are some vacant roles that staff may be able to move to,’ added the source.
The cost cutting comes a few months after Cinch announced a multi-million-pound loss for its year ending April 2022.
Accounts filed at Companies House showed a £149m pre-tax loss for the ‘faff-free’ online car dealer. It clocked up revenue of £815.6m.
A spokesperson for Constellation Automotive Group, which owns Cinch alongside Marshall Motor Group, BCA and WeBuyAnyCar, told Car Dealer: ‘Cinch today (April 6) announced a six per cent reduction of colleagues as it looks to drive efficiencies across its operations in line with its business plan.
‘These changes are always difficult, and our main focus as ever is focusing on supporting impacted employees.’
Last month, the group’s CEO Avril Palmer-Baunack told a Sunday newspaper that Cinch was enjoying ‘record days’ in the first part of this year. She said the ‘strong start’ had ‘surprised’ her.
Cinch’s cost-cutting move follow similar efforts at troubled online used car dealer rival Cazoo. It has cut hundreds of jobs in the past year as it battles to get out-of-control costs back in line.
Last week, Cazoo announced a £704m loss for 2022, with the used car seller counting the cost of shutting down operations across the UK and Europe.
It has closed 15 customer handover centres, a swathe of pre centres, pulled out of Germany, Italy and Spain, shut down its car subscription business and flogged off its data business Cazana.
