AOL cuts 420 jobs at service call centers

[rcjordan]

America Online has cut 420 jobs at customer service call centers as part of an effort to slash annual expenses by more than $100 million dollars..

Reuters [reuters.com]

<added>
Related:
Forbes - AOL Swaps $8 Billion For $400 Million [forbes.com]

[vibgyor79]

What the article doesn't say is that AOL is moving most of the call center jobs to its 3000 seat center in Bangalore, India.

Over here, AOL is on a overdrive recruiting a large number of call center execs. Starting salary is $200 per month for graduates fresh out of college. First, they are given a three month "accent" training so that the Indian accent is suppressed. Then they are allowed to handle "live" clients. Most of them work during odd hours (12 Midnight to 8:00 AM for example).

[bcolflesh]

This is nothing new - many American corps are slowly moving all tech support (and eventually product coding) to India & the Philippines - Earthlink & Hewlitt Packard come to mind...

Regards,
Brent

[curlykarl]

"Starting salary is $200 per month"

where do I sign up ;)

[gsx]

BT (British Telecom) are doing the same, relocating call centres to India and there has been uproar about it.

At $200 per month, you would get about a quarter of an employee in England, though...

[esoteric]

$200 is about 130 pounds...
minimum wage over here is about 4.50 an hour...
so for a 40 hour week is 180 pounds per week!
so 130 pounds pays for half a week!