HSBC adds to outsourcing

High street bank HSBC has become the latest organisation to join the outsourcing trend by confirming that it will cut 4,000 jobs at its UK customer service centres over the next three years and transfer the work to service centres in China, India and Malaysia from the beginning of next year.

The jobs will be lost from sites in Swansea, Birmingham, Sheffield and Brentwood, according to bank workers' union UNIFI who are said to be 'very, very angry' at this latest move.

Although the Bank intends to use voluntary redundancy it has confirmed that it would implement compulsory redundancies if it proved necessary.

UNIFI said: "HSBC's move will be the biggest single export of finance jobs from the UK to Asia."

It is reported that HSBC has already moved more than 1,000 jobs, and other large companies - Prudential (1,000 jobs), Reuters (1,100), BSkyB, Lloyds (1,500), Aviva (1,000) and Axa (450) are among other large companies who have joined this growing trend - with some commentators suggesting the total number of 'exported jobs' has already surpassed 10,000.

Trend

This move reflects a growing trend among UK firms to relocate their customer support and call centre jobs to Asia and has intensified opposition from unions and other groups who believe their members' jobs - now and in the future - are being lost forever as companies seek to reduce costs.

One trade unionist has already said that the UK will become a nation of 'hairdressers and fat cats'.

British Telecom was one of the first companies to incur the wrath of the unions over its moves to relocate some services to India.

Three trade unions recently protested that they had little input to the decisions and therefore were unable to suggest viable alternatives.

Call centres

The main target currently for outsourcing is call centres, which are estimated to employ about half a million people in the UK. This is a particularly hard blow for many regions which have already suffered industrial decline and the call centre industry sprung up in these areas, often in the North and Scotland and frequently employing women and part time workers in already deprived areas.

However, there are growing fears that the call centre industry is the 'thin end of the wedge' and many other more highly-skilled sectors, particularly in IT, will follow.