Secretarial pay rises outstrip inflation

OFFICE secretaries are beating the recession with pay rises outstripping the rate of inflation, according to a report by the Reward research organisation today.

It found they received increases averaging 6.5 per cent over the past year and that pay rises for all clerical staff averaged 4.5 per cent for the year to the end of July.

The average salary for a chief executive's secretary rose to pounds 13,416, while the average typist earned pounds 8,274.

Secretaries in London and the South-east continued to command the highest salaries with a manager's secretary in central London averaging pounds 14,915 a year.

Outside the South-east, secretaries in the Grampian region were the best paid with an average salary of pounds 11,183. Worst paid were those in the South-west, with pounds 9,038 for a manager's secretary.

Figures for the annual average pay of a manager's secretary were: Avon, Severn and North Wiltshire, pounds 10,277; Grampian, pounds 11,183; Hampshire, Dorset and South Wiltshire, pounds 9,480; Hertfordshire and Essex, pounds 10,836; Leicestershire and Northamptonshire, pounds 10,313; London (central), pounds 14,915; London (outer), pounds 12,988; Norfolk and Suffolk, pounds 9,983; North-east Midlands, pounds 9,143; North-west, pounds 9,868; Northern Ireland, pounds 9,595; Central and Southern Scotland, pounds 9,630; South-east Midlands, pounds 10,480; South-west, pounds 9,038; Staffordshire, pounds 9,102; Surrey and West Kent, pounds 10,519; Sussex and East Kent, pounds 10,300; Thames Valley, pounds 12,027; West Midlands, pounds 9,761; Yorkshire and North-east, pounds 9,578.

Clerical and Operative Rewards July 1992; Reward Group; pounds 150.