Vodafone Creates 2,100 UK Customer Service Jobs
Vodafone creates new positions in Scotland, Wales and Northern England, months after multi-million pound fine for billing and complaints issues
Vodafone is to create 2,100 new customer service jobs in the UK as part of an ongoing £2 billion investment programme into its network and services, months after it was fined the best part of £5 million by regulator Ofcom.
Around 800 jobs will be created at an existing customer service centre in Manchester, 150 in Newark, 150 in Stoke and 100 in Glasgow. Six hundred positions in Newcastle, 200 in West Scotland and 100 in Cardiff will be made at Vodafone’s third party partners.
Vodafone customer service
“These new, skilled roles will make a real difference to our customers and a real difference to the communities that are the focus of our customer services investment,” said Vodafone UK CEO Nick Jeffery. “Our ambition is to give our customers the best experience possible, providing an outstanding level of service and support as we continue to invest in building the biggest and best network in Britain.”
The Newbury-based operator was fined £4.63 million by Ofcom last October for “serious and sustained” breaches of consumer protection rules that saw customers pay for services they never received and complaints handled ineffectively.
An investigation found Vodafone agents were not properly trained to ensure all complaints were properly dealt with in a fair, timely manner between January 2014 and November 2015.
The company blamed the problems on a major project that transferred more than 28.5 million customers from seven legacy billing systems onto one – a process that at one point saw complaint levels reach three times the industry average.
Vodafone’s decision to create more UK customer service jobs follows efforts by BT and EE to move operations back to the UK and has been welcomed by a government keen to promote the idea of a ‘Northern Powerhouse.’
“Vodafone is one of our country’s great international success stories and it’s fantastic this global organisation is demonstrating its confidence in the UK by creating new jobs across the north, in the midlands, in Scotland and in Wales,” declared culture secretary Karen Bradley.
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