Copy to Xerox Retirees: Latest Restructuring Affects You, Too

Anticipating a challenging business environment in 2009, Xerox Corp. will slash five percent of its work force, or about 3,000 jobs, in the next six months. Although the copier maker continues to show growth in sales to small- and mid-sized businesses and in its annuity-like businesses, supplies and services sold to repeat customers, Chairman and Chief Executive Anne Mulcahy told analysts on the copier maker's third-quarter 2008 earnings call gross profit margin remains under pressure.

High-end equipment orders from larger enterprises, particularly in the United States and the United Kingdom, fell three percent compared with third quarter 2007 ended September 30. For the foreseeable fututre, Mulcahey said, the ability to deliver double-digit earnings with gross margin below 40 percent would only be accomplished through operating efficiencies, such as reduction in headcount.

Retirees, however, will shoulder some of the burden, too. Starting Jan. 1, 2010, the company will no longer subsidize premiums used to buy supplemental coverage by Medicare-eligible retirees and their spouses, as delineated in the third-quarter 2008 10-Q regulatory filing:

As disclosed in our 2007 Annual Report, at December 31, 2007 the benefit obligation for all retiree health plans was $1.5 billion. In the fourth quarter 2008 we amended our domestic retiree health benefit plan to eliminate the subsidy currently paid to current and future Medicare-eligible retirees effective January 1, 2010. The amendment will result in a net decrease of approximately $225 million in the benefit obligation and a corresponding after-tax increase to shareholders equity. The amendment is also expected to decrease pre-tax net retiree health benefit expense by approximately $15 million for the fourth quarter of 2008 and by an additional $50 million for the full year 2009.

The current allowance is typically in the neighborhood of $1,500 a year for retirees and $1,100 a year for spouses, according to Dave Coriale, chairman of the Association of Retired Xerox Employees

At December 31, 2007, contractual retiree health payments in total for 2008 and 2009 were projected at $105 million and $110 million. In addition, Xerox's pension benefit obligation stood at $10.4 billion, of which $653 was unfunded.

Xerox will take a $400 million restructuring charge in the fourth quarter, but expects to realize cost savings in 2009 of $200 million.

David Phillips

David Phillips has more than 25 years' experience on Wall Street, first as a financial consultant and then as an equity analyst for several investment banking firms. He sifts through SEC filings for his blog The 10Q Detective, looking for financial statement soft spots, such as depreciation policies, warranty reserves and restructuring charges. He has been widely quoted in outlets such as BusinessWeek, The International Herald Tribune, Investor's Business Daily, Kiplinger's Personal Finance, and The Wall Street Journal.

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