Source: infotech.indiatimes.com

British telecom service provider Orange has terminated its outsourcing contract with Bangalore-based BPO firm 24/7 Customer. The latter employed over 400 people to service Orange from Gurgaon.

24/7 Customer has received an official termination letter from Orange. The British company severed its contract with BPO firm Vertex a few quarters ago. But EXL Services, Convergys and IBM Daksh continue to work for it.

‘‘Orange plans to bring its outsourcing share to India to a bare minimum. Dropping 24/7 Customer could just be the beginning,'' said an industry observer. V Bharadhwaj, chief marketing officer, 24/7 Customer , told The Times of India, ‘‘ The client was extremely happy with us. It's just that the company has segmented their end-customers, as part of its new strategy, which preferred to be supported from the UK.''

Bharadhwaj said the company has taken steps to support all employees who worked on this account. "Instead of asking them to leave, we have given options like relocating to our offices in Hyderabad or Bangalore to work on other accounts or facilitating jobs with other BPO players in Gurgaon or Noida. Over 70 per cent of the people have either used these options or left us, while the process will be completed in a month's time,'' he said.

Orange's new CEO, Tom Alexander, had said recently that he would cut the share of the company's outsoucing to India and scale up domestic (UK) presence.

He had said that as part of Orange's new strategy, ‘‘we’re proposing to change the shape of the organization and the way the business works to serve the 21st century customer. These changes are designed to stop duplication within our organization, to ensure we are agile, able to deliver and react quickly to customers.''

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