Sydney, Jan 31(ANI): One of Australia's top clothing retailers, The Iconic, which is a fast-growing online company and brags of having local employees, has been moving its customer service centre to India, but this budge has caused wide scale outrage in the country.
The online clothing retailer has been outsourcing parts of its email customer service to the Indian city of Hyderabad since December, with redundancy announcements expected on Thursday, the Age reports.
It is understood some full-time and casual customer service staff could be made redundant, however, on the clothing website, the company claims it has an excellent team of local customer service consultant, located in their Sydney offices, the paper added.
A customer service employee, who asked to remain anonymous, said staff was told in late November not to worry about their jobs, but on Friday, another staff member's email confirmed there would be redundancies, it further reported.
In an email sent to staff in November, company's managing director Adam Jacobs assured staff that the initial outsourcing would free the local staff members to focus on the contacts and customers that really make a difference.
Unions New South Wales secretary Mark Lennon said the move to offshore jobs was an outrageous decision, adding companies that cloak themselves in the flag can't then turnaround and shift jobs offshore simply to cut costs.
Jacobs said the redundancies were not related to the Indian off shoring, adding they are looking to reduce their team in Sydney by five to eight roles, which represents a small percentage of our full team. (ANI)