Page 41 - China Mobile Limited - Annual Report 2012

China Mobile Limited
Annual Report 2012
35
Financial Review
Personnel
The Group continued to enhance effective personnel management and
incentive mechanisms and promoted vitality and creativity of its staff. The
Group implemented a comprehensive budget management system and
performance-based evaluation system, which helped to maintain its
competitive advantage in terms of human resources while appropriately
controlling personnel expenses. In 2012, in order to support its business
development and professional operations, the Group further strengthened
its personnel capabilities in various aspects and recruited more
employees. As at 31 December 2012, the Group had a total of 182,487
employees. Personnel expenses for 2012 were RMB31.3 billion. The ratio
of personnel expenses to operating revenue remained stable as
compared with the previous year.
Selling Expenses
In order to effectively respond to market competition, enhance the
Group’s future competitiveness, continuously improve service quality and
customer satisfaction, strengthen the relationship with existing customers
and solidify the competitiveness in expanding new customer base, the
Group continued to increase the investment in sales channels, terminals
development, customer services, etc. Selling expenses increased by
RMB8.1 billion from the previous year, representing an increase of 8.3%
when compared with the previous year. Meanwhile, the Group adopted
measures to strengthen the utilization of available sales and marketing
resources and endeavored to achieve a low-cost, highly efficient model
through electronic channels and centralized management of customer
services and optimized handset subsidy models and improved the
subsidy efficiency. In doing so, the Group was able to effectively control
the ratio of selling expenses to the Group’s operating revenue. In 2012,
selling expenses as a percentage of operating revenue was 18.7%, a
slight increase compared to the previous year. In 2012, the average
selling expenses per customer per month were RMB12.8, representing a
further decrease from the previous year, reflecting favorable cost
efficiencies.