Company’s vow to find new clients

10:27am Saturday 15th March 2008

A COMPANY whose Teesside contact centre lost its only client last night vowed to approach every utility company and call centre operator in the region in a bid to safeguard the jobs of the 150 workers at the site.

SembCorp Utilities said yesterday that its OC5 contact centre at Wilton, near Redcar, had been stunned by the announcement that British Gas Business (BGB) had terminated its tenyear contract three years early.

The centre's 150 workers have been assured of their jobs until September, when BGB transfers its work to Leicester, and Semp- Corp has pledged to channel all its efforts into helping its employees stay in work.

Yesterday, Jon Rokk, assistant vice-president of fulfilment at SembCorp, told The Northern Echo that a third of the Wilton workforce had expressed an interest in relocating to Leicester.

Mr Rokk pledged that he would approach companies to see if they would consider moving into the OC5 site.

"We are going to try to generate new business, which will mean approaching most of the main players in the utility field and the main call centres in the North-East. That's something I will start first thing next week,"

he said.

"On the other hand, we have to consider the worst case scenario.

If people do face losing their jobs, we have to make sure we do all we can to help our staff," Mr Rokk said, revealing that training companies and support agencies were already on the OC5 site.

"We have 150 valued, skilled workers here, and want to do everything we can so people know where they stand as early as possible."

Kanat Emiroglu, of BGB, said the decision to move from Wilton had not been taken lightly, but said the company hoped workers would consider redeployment.

"This decision has been taken purely for business reasons and in no way reflects on the excellent level of service we have received from OC5 and its staff over the past seven years," he said.

"OC5 staff have valuable customer service and contact centre skills therefore we are offering attractive relocation packages to them and hope that many will consider moving to Leicester."

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