Telecom exports hundreds more jobs

Broadband helpdesk among services moving offshore

Telecom will outsource a further 250 contact centre jobs to Manila in the next year and a half, bringing the total number of the company's staff there to 700.

The latest shift includes Telecom's broadband support helpdesk. The company will keep its 123 and *123 call centre in Hamilton, its largest call centre.

The move follows a year of trials examining customer satisfaction with offshore contact centres.

"Put simply, if the customer experience offshore could not be proven to match the experience provided by New Zealand-based call centres, we did not proceed," said Alan Gourdie, CEO Telecom Retail.

He said trials had shown technical calls were handled well by off-shore staff.

When the migration of these roles is complete, Telecom will have around 1600 contact centre positions in New Zealand, and 700 positions outsourced in Manila.

Mr Gourdie said the past year had been a time of uncertainty for staff.

"Due to the long timeframe for the migration, we expect the total number of redundancies to be very limited," Mr Gourdie said. 

- © Fairfax NZ News