Australian electricity retailer to outsource some jobs to India

MELBOURNE: Australian electricity retailer TRUenergy has decided to outsource 200 Melbourne jobs, some of them to India.

Approximately 200 Melbourne employees will be made redundant under the agreement with IBM Australia, the company announced in a statement.

TRUenergy managing director Richard McIndoe said the move was the company's response to "a very competitive retail
market".

"Outsourcing these operations will improve TRUenergy's operating systems, enabling the business to maintain competitive prices for customers," he said in a statement.

Of the affected TRUenergy employees, 66 would transfer to IBM to continue their roles, and IBM would offer about 30 other positions to affected TRUenergy employees.

TRUenergy would create an additional 30 new positions as a result of its expansion in the national market, which would be open to all employees, 'The Age' newspaper reported.

The 10-year agreement with IBM includes outsourcing of customer registration systems, billing, credit and collections as well as the development and maintenance of IT applications.

Outsourced customer service positions will be performed in Australia while back-office functions such as administration of credit and billing will be performed in Bangalore.

The agreement will not affect the company's call centres, it said.

The company has spoken to employees individually about how they will be affected, it said adding employees who are not offered employment with IBM or TRUenergy will receive their full leave and redundancy entitlements as well as counselling and help finding a new job.