We regard grievance mechanisms as a crucial tool for preventing and managing adverse impacts on local communities, employees, and other stakeholders, including workers in our value chain. Following the UN Effectiveness Criteria, we aim to address all grievances received, whether they arise from real or perceived issues and whether the complainant is identified or anonymous. These mechanisms provide a channel for identifying potential adverse impacts, resolving grievances, and offering remedies to rights holders where we have caused or contributed to a negative impact. We recognize that these mechanisms do not impede stakeholders’ rights to access judicial or other remedies. Each value chain worker’s reported grievance is thoroughly investigated with a commitment to confidentiality, data protection, protection against retaliation, equal treatment, objectivity, and impartiality. Wherever OMV has caused or contributed to a negative human rights impact, we take remedial actions to counteract or mitigate it, e.g., through financial or non-financial compensation, restitution, restoration, rehabilitation, or other remedial actions. We engage with the affected rights holder while implementing the proposed remedy and ensure that the remedy is rights compatible and does not lead to secondary harm. The following channels are available for our value chain workers to raise their concerns: the SpeakUp Channel, Community Grievance Mechanisms, and our Integrity Platform for whistleblowing. These channels are all established by OMV.
SpeakUp Channel
Our general approach and process to remediating an identified material negative impact related to value chain workers is through the provision of grievance mechanisms. In October 2024, OMV established a new SpeakUp Channel, which provides a process and tool to all workers in our value chain to raise concerns regarding serious work-related misconduct, including discrimination, harassment, unequal employment opportunities, and any violations of work-related human rights (such as forced labor, child labor, and human trafficking), and have them addressed. It is available to any internal or external stakeholder and as such is a common channel for our own workforce and value chain workers. OMV will launch communication activities addressing our business partners in 2025 to enhance accessibility of the Speak-Up Channel for value chain workers. More information about the SpeakUp Channel will become available on the OMV website in 2025. For details on the process through which we support the availability of the SpeakUp Channel, as well as our approach to tracking, monitoring, and ensuring effectiveness, see S1 Own Workforce.
Community Grievance Mechanisms (CGMs)
For issues related to human rights or any other concerns associated with OMV’s operations, such as noise, land degradation, or water pollution, any external parties, including value chain workers, can utilize the locally available Community Grievance Mechanisms (CGM). These mechanisms are developed in line with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights Effectiveness Criteria and applicable national regulations on grievance procedures and are available at our operational sites to enable the reporting of grievances, identification of potential adverse impacts, resolution of issues, and provision of remedies where OMV has caused or contributed to a negative impact. The CGM, managed by community relations teams or focal points, are available at our sites to handle grievances from external stakeholders. Following OMV’s Code of Conduct, business partners shall, to the extent permissible by law, also have an accessible and effective grievance mechanism (or other mechanism in accordance with the applicable law) in place for their own workers and other stakeholders to report any breaches of human rights. During human rights monitoring activities (e.g., on-site checks), we check the accessibility of workers’ grievance mechanisms. We aim to resolve all grievances promptly. Depending on the severity and type of issue, response times can range from within 24 hours for urgent cases to a maximum of 45 days for those requiring detailed investigations. Our approach aligns with Ipieca’s best practice and the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights Effectiveness Criteria, ensuring our grievance mechanism is legitimate, accessible, predictable, equitable, transparent, rights-compatible, continuously improving, and based on dialogue. For details on the process through which we support the availability of our CGMs as well as our approach to tracking, monitoring, and ensuring its effectiveness, see S3 Affected Communities.
Integrity Platform
Our value chain workers are valuable sources of information in identifying breaches of ethical standards. OMV has introduced a whistleblower mechanism called the Integrity Platform to encourage workers to share their concerns. For details on the process through which we support the availability of the Integrity Platform, as well as our approach to tracking, monitoring, and ensuring its effectiveness, see G1 Ethical Business Practices.
The awareness and trust in the grievance channels are assessed during audit interviews with blue-collar workers. In addition to the current way of working, we are in the process of defining a method to measure the effectiveness of the implementation of all three channels. OMV has several grievance channels and mechanisms in place for workers in the value chain to address issues that concern them. All these channels are protected against retaliation, employing methods such as “whistleblower protection,” as legally required by OMV. They are communicated through training sessions, meetings, and events, and are publicly available on our website and at site locations (e.g., CGM). During audits, interviews with blue-collar workers are conducted to assess their trust in these grievance channels.