600 jobs to go at Barclaycard WHISTLEBLOWERS WANTED

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600 jobs to go at Barclaycard | Business | Money | Telegraph

600 jobs to go at Barclaycard

By Stephen Seawright
Last Updated: 4:01pm GMT 06/03/2007
Barclaycard is to close a Manchester call centre in July with the loss of over 600 jobs.
The customer services work from the Manchester call centre will be moved to the Indian cities of Mumbai and Delhi while the sales work will be carried out in Teesside.
The 630 affected staff will be paid until October to help them find other jobs.
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The employees' union, Amicus, condemned the closure which it said was "totally inappropriate" for such a profitable firm.
Barclaycard's profits slumped 40pc to £382m last year on the back of a sharp rise in bad debt charges amid record levels of personal insolvencies across the country.
However, the Barclays group's pre-tax profit jumped 35pc to £7.1bn last year.
Antony Jenkins, chief executive of Barclaycard, said: "Decisions like these are never easy and we will be doing everything we can to support those affected.
"Barclaycard's business is becoming more global and to stay successful we must change how we operate to reflect this."
Staff at the Manchester call centre were given the news this morning and were offered support to find other work.
Amicus official Steve Pantak said: "At a time of increasing pressure on all staff in Barclaycard, we believe it to be totally inappropriate for this large and highly profitable employer to be announcing closures and job losses."