News: Speculation over Manvers O2 jobs

Hundreds of call centre operators working in customer service roles on behalf O2 in the Dearne Valley could see the work outsourced, according to a report in a national newspaper.

Last month, Capita announced that it had been selected by leading communications company Telefónica UK (O2) as their preferred bidder to form a 10 year strategic partnership for customer management services. The deal, worth approximately £1.2 billion and due to commence on 1 July 2013, could see O2 outsource thousands of call centre jobs and make hundreds redundant from four sites - Bury, Glasgow, Leeds and Preston Brook (near Warrington) - to outsource giant Capita.

According to a report seen by The Telegraph, Capita plans to close customer service facilities in Bury and Glasgow.

The paper also reports that: "There will be deep cuts at O2's call centre in the Dearne Valley, too. It currently employs the equivalent of more than 2,000 full time staff but in 2015 is scheduled to provide only 730 roles."

It is claimed that Capita intends to send work offshore by expanding its centres in Cape Town and Mumbai.

In September last year O2 and Telefonica announced that it would work with Capita to transfer already outsourced call centre jobs to South Africa, a move that affected 200 FTE jobs in Rotherham.

O2 has had an operation in Rotherham for over 20 years. In 1992 Ventura signed a customer service contract to support the launch of BTCellnet into the consumer mobile phone market. The contact centre operation in Manvers went live with 40 staff. Growing to a capacity for 2,000 staff, Capita, the UK's leading outsourcing company, purchased Ventura and the Rotherham site in 2011.

Paul Pindar, chief executive officer at Capita, said: "O2 is a brand renowned for its innovative and bold approach to delivering services and, as a result, has a loyal customer base. Capita will design an enhanced service around customers' evolving needs, introduce new capabilities quickly and ensure that customers' experiences continue to be excellent. We will build on our existing long term relationship with O2 through 'best of breed' technology platforms which support service flexibility, quality and efficiency. Close partnership working with O2 will enable us to adapt our customer management services to seamlessly match developments in O2's service offering.

"The announcement demonstrates the added value we can deliver to our clients through deploying our industry leading customer management services capabilities and extensive operational delivery infrastructure and drawing on our experience of the evolving digital landscape."

The union, CWU, described the move as a betrayal. Andy Kerr, CWU deputy general secretary, said: "People are being dispensed with in a cold accountancy exercise designed to save money. This is a betrayal of the staff who have built this company and made it successful."

CWU national official Sally Bridge added: "Staff are already concerned about their job security and O2 is sending very senior managers out to call centres to reassure them that they have a future and that Capita is a decent company. If the documents the Telegraph has seen are right then these are lies and O2 staff won't be able to trust either company."

Capita operates a number of contracts including British Gas, Debenhams, Department for Work and Pensions, Severn Trent Water and National Trust. It is hoped that workers in Rotherham can be redeployed if the O2 work is outsourced abroad.

Capita website
Telegraph article

Images: Capita

Read more...

News: Mayor calls in at Capita

The Mayor of Rotherham, Councillor Shaun Wright was given the opportunity to visit one of the region's largest employers recently as he took a tour of Capita's Dearne Valley customer management contact centre in Rotherham.

Capita, the UK's leading outsourcing company, purchased Ventura, a customer contact specialist, for £65m last year. The company employs over 5,000 staff from the area and provides outsourced multi-channel contact centre services to a wide range of organisations across the UK.

Bruce MacLeod, managing director of Capita's customer management business, said: "We were delighted to welcome the Mayor to our Rotherham site this week and are keen to continue to support the good work of the Council in the regeneration of the region. The local community in which we work and do business is extremely important to us."

The Mayor added: "During my Mayoral year I have tried to visit as many businesses and companies as possible across the Borough, to thank them and their employees for their investment and hard work in making our town a success at a time when commerce and workers are operating in a very difficult climate.

"Saying thank-you and helping to shine a spotlight on some of the tremendous enterprises throughout Rotherham is a privilege and the very least I can do as Mayor.

"It was extremely interesting and very informative to see Capita's facility in Rotherham at close quarters and to hear how the Manvers site delivers a world class service. I am very proud that Rotherham people are playing such a big role in assisting the customers of some of the country's biggest household names. "

Reccomended reading: How Can You Contact an Online Casino?

Andrew Klinkenberg of Rotherham Investment and Development Office, the regeneration arm of Rotherham Borough Council, added: "The Mayor has been very keen to use his year in office to support local businesses and so it made perfect sense to arrange a visit to Capita which is one of the biggest employers in the borough and vitally important to Rotherham's economy.

"Capita has played a huge role in the on-going investment and regeneration within the Dearne Valley and we look forward to continued close working with them in the future."

Capita webiste

Images: Capita

Read more...

News: Ventura staff get on their bikes

Staff at the Ventura contact centre in Rotherham are taking part in an innovative scheme to encourage more people to commute to work by bike.

Last month 65 members of staff at the Manvers facility were the first to receive bikes as part of Rotherham Borough Council's "Cycle To Work" project - geared to people who want to give up the car or bus and give cycling to work a go.

Each will receive a bike of their choice and cycle training as well as full support over a four week challenge period.

At the end of the four weeks, participants can either hand their bike back or will take the opportunity to buy their bikes at a reduced rate and continue to cycle to work.

The scheme aims to make it as easy as possible for participants to cycle to work so they can experience the many benefits of commuting by bike. These include quicker and less stressful journeys; improved health, fitness and wellbeing; as well as saving money on car maintenance, petrol, car parking or bus fares.

The package of support includes basic cycle training to improve competence and confidence; help with route planning, free bike maintenance support as well as email and telephone support throughout the trial period.

The Manvers staff, are the first in Rotherham to take advantage of the scheme, which is being supported by Transportation Officers at Rotherham Borough Council in conjunction with cycling organisation, Cycle Experience, who are running the project.

It has been funded from the Local Sustainable Transport Fund - a national Government initiative geared to stimulating sustainable access to jobs and reducing carbon.

South Yorkshire bid into the fund and Rotherham will receive a proportion of nearly £5m awarded to South Yorkshire. South Yorkshire is currently making a further bid for more than £20 million to improve sustainable access to work through low carbon travel options - such as walking,cycling, and public transport.

Vicky Jackson of Ventura said: "As part of our strategic objective to reduce the number of people travelling by car to site, we are undertaking a number of initiatives with Rotherham Borough Council to encourage the use of other modes of transport to come to work.

"We have had a fantastic and unprecedented response to the Cycle to Work challenge and thank all of our team that are taking part! It's a huge advantage to our team to be able to try cycling to work and feel the benefits of it in order to potentially make a long term change to their travel arrangements. To also receive guidance on the most effective route to take, and safety advice is an even bigger incentive."

Ventura website
Rotherham Council website

Read more...

News: Capita acquires Ventura

Capita, the UK's leading outsourcing company, has purchased Ventura, a customer contact specialist and employer of thousands of people in Rotherham.

Ventura, the trading name of Club 24 Ltd, is the third party customer services management arm of Next plc and manages more than 50 million customer contacts each year for a range of additional private and public sector clients. Ventura is particularly strong in the private sector with clients including a number of leading telecoms, utilities and retail companies, such as O2, Orange, British Gas and British Midland.

Ventura have their headquarters in Leeds and opened a contact centre in Manvers in 2000, providing capacity for 2,000 staff.

The award-winning company made a pro forma operating profit for its financial year to January 31 2011 of £8m and a turnover of £156m.

Capita already employ 37,000 people at more than 350 sites, including 64 business centres across the UK, Ireland, the Channel Islands and India. They enjoyed revenues for 2010 of £2,744m.

Capita stated that the acquisition, for a cash consideration of £65m on a cash-free, debt-free basis, will increase their capacity for customer management services, providing additional front office services and flexible capacity for existing Group clients. It would also create the opportunity to provide Ventura's client base with access to Capita's wider service offering.

Next stated that it intends to continue to use the services of Ventura that are currently provided to Next and use the majority or all of the proceeds to buy back and cancel its own shares.

Paul Pindar, Chief Executive of The Capita Group Plc said: "The acquisition of Ventura is a good strategic fit with our existing integrated outsourcing services.

"Ventura's flexible service model complements our established customer contact operations which are integral to many of our long term contracts and businesses. It also provides Capita with opportunities to offer wider customer management and back office outsourced services to key, blue chip clients across additional industry sectors.

"We will be able to offer an enhanced customer management proposition, including providing customer acquisition and sales, help and information lines, technical support and emergency response both on a long or more flexible basis, alongside our breadth of administration and professional support services."

Ian Cherry, Managing Director, Ventura, added: "This is a great way to take the business forward; this news will strengthen our service to clients and business prospects. We are very excited about the future and look forward to offering our clients even more innovative solutions in customer management outsourcing than ever before."

Capita website
Ventura website

Images: Ventura

Read more...

News: Ventura staff answer the call for Red Nose Day

Ventura in Rotherham did its bit for Red Nose Day and Comic Relief, handing part of its contact centre over to the annual charity night.

80 telephone lines were manned by over 130 volunteers from Ventura, who gave up their own time to take donations from the public between 6pm and midnight at the company's Dearne Valley site.

Over 2,400 calls were taken by Ventura staff, from advisor to general manager level.

Ian Cherry, Managing Director of Ventura said: "Our team of exceptional volunteers donated their spare time to Comic Relief and the vulnerable people it helps here in the UK and in Africa. Spurred on by the nation's generosity we had a record-breaking and fun-fuelled night!"

In total £80,995.50 was pledged through Ventura's contact centre. The largest single pledge taken was for £1,000 from a personal caller.

The team also let their hair down and fundraised themselves during the day by doing their very own bush tucker trials, fancy dress and prize drawer raffles, all in the name of charity.

As the evening drew to a close £74,360,207 had been raised which is the highest total reached on the night in Red Nose Day's 23 year history.

On the support from call centres, Helen Puddefoot, Comic Relief's Head of Campaign Management, said: "Ventura is one of a team of UK call centres taking donations and we'd like to say a massive Thank You to all the staff who will be giving up their precious Friday night. We also want to thank BT which is again providing the infrastructure behind the record-breaking telephony system."

Ventura website

Images: comicrelief.com

Read more...

News: Ventura and O2 celebrate 18 years in partnership

Ventura, one of the UK's largest customer management outsourcing companies and O2, the UK's leading provider of mobile phones and broadband, celebrated an 18 year working relationship at Ventura's Dearne Valley contact centre in Rotherham last month.

In 1992 Ventura signed a customer service contract to support the launch of BTCellnet into the consumer mobile phone market. The contact centre operation went live with 40 staff.

Ventura and O2 celebrated their 18-year milestone with a birthday party. The week long event included fun activities, recognition events and heart felt celebrations. An 18 year timeline depicted the relationship milestones and gave a great insight into how technology and the telcos market has rapidly changed over time.

On visiting the site during the week of celebrations Cheryl Black, Customer Service Director at O2 said "I was delighted to be able to meet so many people at Ventura who had been working with O2 since the beginning - it demonstrates the strength of this long and successful relationship that we have such experienced and committed people helping our customers.

"It was also a great opportunity to thank everyone at O2 Dearne Valley for their contributions to turning more and more O2 customers into fans."

Ventura provides services for O2's UK consumer and business customers including handling incoming customer service calls, inbound calls securing new customers, helping customers change tariffs and a technical helpdesk offering support from Ventura's most experienced agents to the most complex enquiries.

Ventura handles over 1.3m inbound calls for O2 a month and partnering with Ventura has provided significant benefits for O2 including saving 10,000 customers a month and increasing customer satisfaction.

For Children in Need this year, fifty telephone lines were manned by over 100 volunteers from Ventura in Rotherham, who gave up their own time to take donations from the public between 6.00pm and midnight.

Ventura website

Images: ventura-uk.com

Read more...

News: Ventura commended at national employer awards

Call centre operator and one of the Dearne's biggest employers, Ventura, has been highly commended for the support it offers working mums. Ventura was highly commended at the Jobs4Mums awards, organised by jobs4mothers.com and Take a Break Magazine, at a ceremony at Downing Street. The awards recognise businesses who see the value in offering flexible, family friendly work to employees and were presented by Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Minister for Women and Equality, Harriet Harman earlier this month. Ventura was recognised for its range of flexible working options that encourage mums to come to work including; sliding shifts to accommodate commitments, time off for dependants and a variety of part-time shifts. It also fully supports and promotes "Kidsunlimited Childcare Vouchers", which could save an average working mum £1195 in childcare costs and is currently piloting a term time working scheme, which allows individuals to request time off over the school holiday period. HR Director at Ventura, Christine Petyt, said: "We’re delighted to be receiving the award. We are keen supporters of working mums and aim to offer the initiatives and flexibility to enable them to balance a working life and being a mum. Twenty-five percent of Ventura’s employees work in part-time or job share roles so it’s important we provide the necessary benefits and opportunities to meet their needs." Gordon Brown said: "It’s great that so many employers have positive views about promoting work-life balance and that more and more managers are actively promoting flexible work practices. I hope to see even more companies following in your footsteps."

Ventura website

jobs4mothers website

Rotherham

Read more...

News: Call centre operator warns of redundancies

The Yorkshire Post reports on the closure of Ventura's Cardiff contact centre and the potential redundancies. The paper understands that the company is aiming to redeploy staff to other UK centres and that the number of jobs under threat at the site could be as many as 600. Ventura has its head offices in Leeds and employ over 4000 people at their Manvers site (9000 in total) in Rotherham, placing them as the largest single employer in the area.
Ventura website
Yorkshire Post article
BBC article

Rotherham

Read more...

News: Rotherham contact centre aims to plug skills gap

Learndirect Business is offering employers the chance to improve the skills of their workforce with the launch of a new NVQ (National Vocational Qualification) programme. NVQ training can provide benefits including increased employee competence and confidence, better organisational efficiency, greater productivity, and a lower staff turnover rate. They are also designed to be a flexible and practical way to ensure they meet the needs of business without disrupting the schedules of employees. Lisa Coggan from Rotherham-based Ventura, the UK’s largest customer management outsourcing company, said: “It is vital to our business that employees are well qualified, and having many of our staff learning through learndirect Business has made this easy.”

learndirect Business website

Ventura website

Rotherham

Read more...