MELBOURNE, 1 FEBRUARY, 2012: A bus company here has stunned its staff by paying them bonuses to the tune of A$15 million for their hard work and loyalty.

Workers at Grenda Corporation were awestruck when they received bonuses averaging A$8,500 paid into their accounts, with some staff receiving as much as A$30,000, the Herald Sun daily reported.   

Family-owned Grenda sold off its 66-year-old transit operations recently and decided to share a slice of the profits as a thank-you gesture with its staff. 

Patriarch Ken Grenda, 79, and sons Geoff and Scott, have been dubbed as Australia's most generous bosses after rewarding all 1,800 staff, from drivers to senior executives, as an acknowledgement of their contribution to the company's success.     

Grenda was quoted as saying "A business is only as good as its people and our people are fantastic." 

"This is to recognise that. We have had people here who are second generation, and one fellow in the same job for 52 years," he said.  

The company grew from just four bus routes in the suburb of Dandenong in 1945 to operating 1,300 buses in Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth. 

Even staff who had worked with Grenda for three months or more received anywhere from about A$1,000 to A$30,000 pre-tax.  

The company sold its transit operations to Melbourne operator Ventura for about A$400 million last year. 

Grenda is also Australia's largest bus maker, building about 600 buses a year.

It expects to finalise the sale of Volgren,its bus building business, to a Brazilian company on Thursday.

 

-Bernama