Town 'deserves more' from Barclaycard, claims furious MP after 140 jobs are lost
Union leaders have pledged to do all they can to ensure 140 staff threatened with redundancy, following Barclaycard's decision to move their fraud department to India, do not lose their jobs.
The Chronicle & Echo revealed yesterday that the Northampton-based credit card giant had announced plans to create a global "centre of excellence" in India, leaving dozens of employees at the UK base in Brackmills facing the axe.
The decision has been met with anger locally, amid fears it will do little to help the Northamptonshire economy and allegations customer service levels will drop.
Brian Binley, the Conservative MP for Northampton South, said he was "bitterly disappointed" by the job losses.
He said: "I know some companies have made similar moves to India but brought the operation back to the UK because people have been unable to understand the dialect.
"That's no smear on the Indian sub continent but the aim of long distance communication is to be able to understand each other at a distance.
"I was shocked by the reasons they have given and they simply don't stand up. I think the town deserves a lot better from Barclaycard."
The news was revealed on the same day it was announced that credit card fraud in the UK had fallen by 28 per cent to 440million in the past 12 months, the first decrease since 2006.
Three weeks ago, the card giant's parent company, Barclays, announced record profits of 11.6billion.
But despite growing resentment from employees, who claimed morale at the firm's base in Pavillion Drive, Brackmills, was at "an all-time low", Barclaycard officials were confident the move was in the company's best interests.
Barclaycard spokesman Andrew Bond said: "We are always looking at ways to improve efficiency levels and this is one of the main factors behind the move but it is also about creating a global centre of excellence for tackling fraud.
"We want to create a more focused service centre for our customers and the service they will receive from India will be every bit as good as the current operation in Northampton.
"We are providing support for all those affected and looking to redeploy people within the company wherever possible."
Union leaders were expected to meet affected employees today to discuss potential redeployment opportunities within Barclaycard.
Fred Hanna, spokesman for the Unite union, said: "This is something that has been negotiated at a national level but affects 140 permanent positions in Northampton.
"We have reluctantly accepted their business case and we hope the arrangements we have come to will minimise the number of compulsory redundancies and maximise redeployment opportunities.
"We will be meeting those affected and know a 2,000 retraining grant has been made available to help find alternative roles within the company for some staff."
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140 jobs lost at Barclaycard in card giant's Indian move
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