Excelior seeks 50 new staff for Bendigo call centre

Stuart Corner
Thursday, 22 July 2010 14:36

IT Industry - Strategy

Call Centre operator, Excelior Australia, says it has secured 50 new jobs for its Bendigo contact centre and will start recruitment immediately.

Excelior CEO John Watkinson said that the Bendigo centre had suffered considerably in the past, because it had been reliant on one major client, but his company's faith in its ability to broaden the operation had begun to pay off.

"When Excelior acquired the Bendigo contact centre in 2007 all jobs were scheduled to go as the previous operator moved the positions offshore. We have managed to keep the centre going and find some new and slightly different work for the operation."

The centre was previously owned by AAPT, which announced in November 2006 that it would close the centre, along with one in Robina Queensland. The closures would have meant the loss of some 300 jobs in each of Bendigo and Robina, but it was able to transfer the centres to Excelior.

However it was not Excelior's faith alone that kept Bendigo going. What the company did not mention in today's announcement was the fact that, in May 2009, it was given a $300,000 grant by the Victorian Government to support the education and retraining of employees at call centre.

Watkinson said at the time that the funding had been vital to keeping jobs in the region and facilitating expansion. "While we have had some significant success in attracting additional contact centre work to Bendigo, dramatically slowing the phased ramp-down of jobs that we had feared after our major client AAPT withdrew, we needed this State Government assistance to maintain our viability. We are both relieved and delighted that the Brumby Government, through minister Jacinta Allan, has been able to support us at this most difficult time."

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