Unionized intracity bus drivers in Seoul have announced plans to stage a general strike starting on Thursday.

The Seoul city bus chapter under the Korean Automobile and Transport Workers' Federation said on Monday that the decision to begin the strike at 4 a.m. Thursday was reached on Saturday.

The union is set to hold a vote on the strike on Tuesday by all its over 18-thousand members before conducting last-ditch negotiations with their employers starting 2:30 p.m. Wednesday.

The two sides have held seven rounds of negotiations and two rounds of advance arbitration on the union's request for a wage hike and an improved salary class system since December 28 last year.

The union has accused the Seoul city government, their actual negotiating partner, of failing to respond to its demand for a 12-point-seven-percent hike in hourly wages in an apparent push for a wage freeze.