British airline BMI to move jobs to India

[fractional]

Over 150 workers at Castle Donington-based British airline BMI face redundancy because their jobs are to be moved to India.
BMI announced that 154 accounts department workers, all based at its Donington Hall head office, have been told they are at risk of redundancy. The move followed a 12-month review of "systems and practices".
The will be carried out in India, not Britain. Although 154 workers have been given notice of redundancy, Shepherd said the change would create 21 new posts at Donington Hall. (-154 + 21 = -134)
The company that has supplied the computer system is running it from India, meaning the jobs will be replaced by low cost posts.:ok: for the recipients of the new jobs :{ for the jobless guys. :D These are the bean counters.

[goldeneye]

There are alot of companies with there back offices in india now, Thomas Cook have most of there back office and admin (including pay-role) work done in india, and i know from experience there useless.

[alterego]

Have to say that those in the Hall are useless anyway so the only difference will be our profit share at Baby will go up!

[Irishwingz]

Alterego, Inkjet

Unless I've misunderstood you, thats a pretty cutting statement you've just made. Losing jobs, no matter what you think is serious. Maybe when you grow up and have some responsibilities you'll think differently.

[cactusbusdrvr]

Having dealt with electronic tech support from India I have to say that this would be a bad move. I called one firm several times with a recalcitrant piece of gear without much success until I finally found someone who could speak coherent English. The irony - that person was in the Phillipines!

[Curious Pax]

You get what you pay for when you outsource to India. If you pay the cheapest rate then the people your customers deal with won't have had the language training or technical training that more expensive deals would give. You also lose the experience that exists behind the IT systems that the Indians are given, so if that experience was masking serious inadequacies in those systems then the service will be poorer. I'm against transferring this sort of stuff to India on principle, but I blame the companies doing it for skimping on the cost of it, and running poor systems rather than the Indian guys who end up trying to make the best of it all.

Some of our support functions have moved out there, and fortunately our company is a bit more clued up than just taking the cheapest deal, and as a result the service we get is at least comparable to that which went before.

[one four sick]

I hope they send the Pay Discrepancies department with it as well, THE most useless feature in the "modern" world.
As useful as an ashtray on a motorbike!

[alterego]

Irishwingz

The company has a dinosaur in the hall. The survival off thousands of jobs is more important than a couple of hundred expensive incompetents.

This is a case of cutting the waste to save the masses.

[carlos vandango]

Well I hope BMIndia make a better job of it than they did with the call centre for ticketing and customer services.the service is rubbish. I changed a reservation recently and it took 35 minutes. The staff are pleasant enough but they havn't a clue. Not the way forward.

[Tarek Nor]

Maybe it is time for companies and individuals to say no on principle.

Our economies and skills are being exported to the 3rd by greedy
self serving businessmen. They are lining their own pockets at our
expense.

When it's all done there aren't any pits left to send your kids down,
how are you going to pay the bills ?

[Desert Diner]

If enough jobs go, who will be left that can afford those £25.00 tickets??:bored:

[Tony Flynn]

If you export your customer service to the 3rd world, don't be surprised when you get 3rd world customer service.

[Sausagehead]

The groups ERJ are C checked in Portugal and the 737 in Eastern Europe, its a labour intensive job, which with the proper oversight can be done in low cost labour markets, with the best will in the world accounts and other back office functions are no different.


That's another argument. I suppose if bmi & baby are still here in a few years and making a profit the current strategies of outsourcing and the NBM will prove to be good.

I wouldn't bet on it though.

[INKJET]

The business history of the UK post Maggie proves that we don't need to do everything in the UK to provide high levels of employment, even now with people from just about every nation flooding into the UK there is still plenty of work for those that want it, many said that MOL would kill pilot wages, but they are amongst the best paid short haul jobs in Europe, sure you have to work, but the days of BA work shy employee's are fast becoming history, let face it if bmi didn't hold 14% of LHR slots it would have been game over years ago.

In less than 10 years there will be a third short haul runway at LHR , bmi & BA can't expect to keep Ryan and Easy out of the new slot allocations that will go with it.

bmi are right to push into longhaul a quickly as they can afford to, likley that by then the only mainline flights (short haul) that will feed into LHR will be the 5 route that have kept a business cabin (EDI,GLA,BHD,DUB,BRU) no doubt baby(if they haven't flogged it to pay for L/H aircraft) will operate into the north runway.

So its no point crying about the past and blaming India, if you have ever worked in a call centre you will know that many of the their employee's are from the former commonwealth, there is no difference between having an Indian answering the call here or in Mumbia, apart from about a 1/5th of the cost and a much lower staff turnover, give em a chance i say!!

Viktor

[gmidc]

Irishwingz
The company has a dinosaur in the hall. The survival off thousands of jobs is more important than a couple of hundred expensive incompetents.
This is a case of cutting the waste to save the masses.
Who said waste was being cut? These jobs will still exist, except they will be located thousands of miles away and the staff doing the job will be on a wage that is approximately a tenth of what a UK worker could expect.
So maybe you can explain why moving 130 or so jobs to India is 'cutting waste', bearing in mind that the average salary of those working in the affected department is probably around the £13K mark. Hardly 'expensive incompetents' are they?

[ZQA297/30]

So, with tongue only half in cheek, can we say that it is only a matter of time before pilot jobs are exported to the cheapest supplier? :confused:

What I am really waiting for is those big exec jobs to be outsourced.
:E

[keyboard flier]

I hope they send the Pay Discrepancies department with it as well, THE most useless feature in the "modern" world.
As useful as an ashtray on a motorbike!

This section has only gone downhill over the last 12 months, because I know that the person that was doing the job up to the end of last year moved on. They then moved the FCA job into payroll and that's where the problems started!!!:(

[wawkrk]

In my experience, trying to have a telephone conversation with someone who does not speak so clearly in English,is a disaster.
Even more confusing,the staff are sometimes given English names like Kevin.
For some UK companies this is great.
The number of complaints reduce rapidly as most callers just simply give up.
Not against giving others a chance, so why dont we just move the whole ****** country somewhere else.Outsourcing en mass !!!

[rsoman]

As I understand it is the revenue accounting which is moving on to India. The company which does this does it already does the same for the past few years for QR among others. BA promoted (and later sold off) its back office subsidiary WNS many years back. LH has a company in DEL doing a lot of work for many years, as did Swiss Air (in its earlier avtar- SR) and SQ develops some of its software with a joint venture with an Indian company TCS at Chennai for the last decade or so.

Voice call centres - yes - there can be a problem - product familiarity is hardly up to the desired levels and with the emphasis on "capsule training" and speaking better English than the Beeb themselves (instead of checking trivial things like geography), I can understand the frustrations which many of the other posters have faced. But then the blame should be on the UK companies themselves, instead of accepting the "lowest quote" from a call centre vendor, they should have some insistence on quality standards.

[Sausagehead]

So, with tongue only half in cheek, can we say that it is only a matter of time before pilot jobs are exported to the cheapest supplier? :confused:
What I am really waiting for is those big exec jobs to be outsourced.
:E

Too true, with the Engineering and Revenue Acounts culls no Senior Manager positions seem to be affected.


I'm saddened by some of the "I'm alright jack" attitudes on this thread.

[Little Blue]

Sausagehead, I agree with you.
It appears that there is very little empathy from the valleys (Alterego), for his work colleagues at the hall.
We all have a job to do (or did, if you are one of the unfortunates in revenue). If you believe that everyone sat in the hall is unable to do their job properly, then maybe you should get off your own ass and come and tell each and everyone one of us just where we're going wrong.
I could very easily go into just what is wrong with certain aspects of the CWL base, but I hope that I am a bit more professional than that.
We are all but cogs in this wheel, aren't we.

[fractional]

This is globalisation. I had another post few days ago on an issue similar to this one. Pls ignore EK because this post was for that Forum.
Gd luck to guys affected by this decision.
QUOTE
It´s a buzz like everywhere else. Generaly speaking, worldwide politicians, greedy owners, share-holders and their cronies wanted it for a long time and they got it. It is called the globalisation or relocation of assests to cheaper labour available markets. Obviously EK isn´t relocating but look around for clues.
There is no longer safety for one to plan his/her life unless there is money from a different source. Unfortunately, only a very tiny minority can do it by working in whatever trade as a hobby. Most of us have to work it hard for a living.
People are looking for and slowly finding better jobs giving way to those with either no jobs or less off. I´ve been globetrotting and it is difficult to find one company doing it as most would like it to be. Safety, promotion from within, and all those good practices are things of the past.
Nowadays, bean counters are the most important people to top tier managers because "end of fiscal year numbers" dictate measures to implement future plans in detriment of sound, constructive and focussed goals and practices. Middle tier (responsible) managers then have to reluctantly go back and redraw plans or resign the post or even look for other "greener" pastures. The cronies applaud and live happily ever after...
The latter don´t really care less about the staff. They reached their personal financial targets (bonuses) and that´s it.
I cannot recall seeing or hearing a "good pro-active and balanced aviation manager" survive a very long time. He/she will eventually become a target for demotion or firing in order to "clear" the way for other plans.
Shareholders demand good returns from top managers who in turn use bean counters to squeeze budgets and so on…
My sympathy goes out to all of those going and joining. It is not easy to plan life like that anyway, let alone the guys with kids to look after.
At the moment, and until the scenario changes (???), there is little one can do. Do it where/when you can.
Loyalty is very relative. It applies mainly in small outfits where one knows everyone including the owner(s) and/or his/her family members, etc.. But people want more legitimately; career, Ts & Cs, a larger aircraft, etc., and other problems may rise.
It´s a full life circle. We heard this before for endless years and it will continue for many years to come.
Listen out for signs, sights & sounds. Make a safe move and don´t be sorry. Good luck !!!
UNQUOTE

[El Oso]

Have to agree.

As one who has worked in that part of the world, there are some real gems there (well educated / smart etc). But by and large the quality of service you will recieve from support staff there is, IMHO, poor. I found it often difficult to understand their "English" and your customers have to discipline themselves in speech as they don't understand UK slang - at all...
Also the level of common sense one expects back home is rarely found.

When will the short sighted greedy little SOBs learn - YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR!

But then perhaps that is rarely their concern as profit shares, "performance" bonuses (ie operating profit at the expense of lost depth of experience and deferred maintenance etc) and a good share price at the end of your 2 or 3 year Management contract is perhaps more interesting. Buggering the long term future of the company or screwing those who built it often appears irrelevant to our fearless leaders.

:sad:

[Desert Nomad]

The back office function being outsourced is the revenue accounting side. Fortunately the company they are using will not be picking up the phones. The down side is that if they mess up this work BMI get no revenue!

As far a the jobs go this is what they had to say:

There are 154 positions at Hastings House potentially at risk of redundancy as a result of the restructure, but 21 new positions will be created, leading to a net reduction of around 133 positions at head office as a consequence of these changes. However, we will look to offer redeployment opportunities and a voluntary redundancy scheme as the first option in any reduction in the number of staff. We have every confidence that this will result in less than 100 actual redundancies within the company

[sevenforeseven]

BMI have always looked for the cheaper option for everything and nothing will stop the "pinta ale and a meat pie" mob from doing any different.
Oh yes forgot to add its another nail in the coffin for a airline run by staff who are just superb, but unfortunatley working for a management team of "barrow boys". Sorry but thats the way it is and always has been and always will be.

[shuttlebus]

Have to agree with the problems of speaking to India, although it wasn't much of a conversation, as I ended up having to use the phonetic alphabet for everything.

"No, that is bravo echo lima foxtrot alpha sierra tango".... aghhh, yes it did get that basic.

Not the first time either... on several occasions I have had my surname spelt wrongly, which truly messes up self-check-in.

First time had to queue and then got sent back to the ticket desk to get it sorted! Next time I knew what to do and saved the queue up, but this is far from ideal when either you are in business and don't want to queue or are in economy, where bmi are now actively pushing self-check-in.....

Come on guys (and gals...) SORT IT OUT

Regards,

Frustrated Shuttlebus

P.S. Heard a rumour that bmi are not replacing their A321s when the leases run out and will be an all 320/319 airline? Reduced capacity on busy flights from then on then? Seems a bit silly, but then maybe the yields outside peak hours don't justify a bigger bus.....

Anyone hear anything different?

[one four sick]

Now look.
This whole Hall thang.
The paymentdiscrepancieseffindotcomthang is just sooooooooooooooooo inefficient that I think even dot Patel must be more able than them, even if it's in Urdu only. Let this Hall swarm move to India, or the threat of it make those in the Hall to become super efficient, as I have taxi payments outstanding since the 4th century.
Now I hope Bish is reading this.

1 4 sick

[Sausagehead]

Now look.
This whole Hall thang.
The paymentdiscrepancieseffindotcomthang is just sooooooooooooooooo inefficient that I think even dot Patel must be more able than them, even if it's in Urdu only. Let this Hall swarm move to India, or the threat of it make those in the Hall to become super efficient, as I have taxi payments outstanding since the 4th century.
Now I hope Bish is reading this.
1 4 sick
I hope for your sake Bish isn't reading this.
He'll ask why you're using Taxis when you could be using the bus, or even a bike (or in the case of baby a trike) :)