Alorica closes Manhattan centre

Contact centre company Alorica said it will close its Manhattan contact centre on 4 September, leaving 150 people searching for new jobs, reports 49News.

While vice-president for economic development, John Pagen, says this is unfortunate, he adds it's a sign of the industry, not Manhattan's economy. Pagen says it's symptomatic of all call centres. "It's not just this region, many call centres are closing across the country."

Marketing director for Alorica, Danel Kuhlman, says it's closing the Manhattan call centre because of a decreased number of calls. She says the call centre in Topeka is hiring and the company will do whatever possible to help employees find a job.

According to an Avaya Contact Centre Consumer Index 2010 report generated by callcentres.net, the likelihood of businesses in Asia-Pacific losing customers who are dissatisfied with their contact centre interaction to competition, in 2010, is as high as 62%, reports CXO Today.

The report shows 7% of the respondents said they had already switched their business elsewhere. Of the respondents, 48% stated they prefer speaking with a customer service representative without using any technology. As many as 63% rated the phone as the most preferred mode to contact a company.

The Internet came second, with 16% of respondents from all industries having a preference for it, against 11% the previous year.

Macquarie Telcom, the hosting and telecommunications provider, denies retrenching 40 employees in customer support areas. The staff cuts allegations emerged after the Sydney-based company unveiled its MacquarieHUB contact centre, writes International Business Report.

Latest reports claim 40 employees, who worked in customer staff areas, were told they would be laid off two days before the opening of the contact centre. Employees from project management, sales, provision and account management were reportedly offered redundancy packages at the minimum legal requirement.

The company says such claims are “factually incorrect”. Over the past year, Macquarie offered redundancy packages to only six of its employees and they were not connected to the new contact centre.