Lotte Homeshopping Inc., the TV channel of retail giant Lotte Group, is facing a staff exodus as many employees are poised to leave the company following a series of negative incidents, industry sources said Thursday.
Major local headhunters have been flooded with resumes of Lotte Homeshopping employees wanting to change jobs since mid-June, when the prosecution launched a full-fledged probe into irregularities involving the renewal of its business license last year.
"It seems that Lotte Homeshopping employees are scrambling to trying to pursue new jobs, believing that the company has no future due to the scandals," a headhunting company official said.
Asking not to be named, a Lotte Homeshopping employee echoed the view, saying a considerable number of workers, who are worried that the company may cease to exist after two years, think they should "escape from the sinking ship as fast as possible."
However, it was not immediately known how many Lotte Homeshopping workers have actually left the company.
A company official at the nation's No. 3 home shopping channel said there have been not many departures yet, though staff members feel agitated in the wake of the incidents that have occurred at the same time.
Lotte Homeshopping has been under prosecution probe on suspicions that it intentionally cut the number of executives and employees implicated in a bribery scandal to renew its channel license for another three years in April 2015, which was discovered by state auditors in February.
In mid-July, prosecutors summoned Lotte Homeshopping CEO Kang Hyeon-gu for questioning over his role in the case. Prosecutors suspect Kang created slush funds and directed company officials to give kickbacks to bureaucrats in the process.
In late May, the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning ordered Lotte Homeshopping to suspend its six-hour prime time broadcasting for six months starting from late September, for submitting false documents to renew its business license.
The nation's communications and broadcasting watchdog decided last week to impose a 180 million won ($163,000) fine on Lotte Homeshopping for illegally providing three nonlife insurers with private information on 29,000 customers between February 2009 and April 2014.
Lotte, which has sprawling businesses in both South Korea and Japan, has seen a series of scandals since last year, including a sibling feud over control of the nation's fifth-largest conglomerate. In March, Shin Dong-bin, the founder's second son and incumbent chief, won shareholder support over his elder brother. (Yonhap)
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