Orange tells call centre workers they can keep their jobs if they relocate to the Philippines

Orange has apologised after telling its employees they could only keep their call centre jobs if they moved to new offices ... in the Philippines.

Orange tells call centre workers they can keep their jobs if they relocate to the Philippines.
Orange told night shift call centre workers at its Darlington office that they could accept redundancy packages or relocate 7,000 miles to Manila, above. Credit: Photo: EPA

The company, which has cut 1,200 jobs since it merged with T-Mobile to create Everything Everywhere, told 40 night shift workers at its Darlington call centre that they could take alternative, less lucrative roles, or relocate 7,000 miles to Manila.

Staff claim the company gave them details of a “rice allowance” they could claim as part of the transfer to IBM, Orange’s outsource partner in the Philippines.

An employee who declined to be named told The Northern Echo that: “No-one in their right mind would want to move to Manila.

“When we asked for details of the transfer package we were handed a sheet of paper with what the IBM employees receive which is less than £200 a month, with a rice allowance and a laundry allowance. ”

A small number of staff have accepted severance packages, some have taken alternative roles at the Darlington office, but lost their £8,000-a-year night shift allowances.

A couple of employees have been placed on “special leave”, receiving basic pay while they consider moving to Manila.

An Everything Everywhere spokesman said: “We are continuing discussions with a very small number of employees who have expressed an interest in the option of transferring to Manila .”

Later on Monday the company said offering to transfer staff to the Philippines was a “HR error”. “[We] will be making it clear that we’re not proactively asking or expecting people to move to Manila. The information given out was not done officially and we apologise to those involved.”

Everything Everywhere hit the headlines last year when it emerged that it had informed staff of their looming redundancy using a “traffic light” colour code system.