Concerns have been raised about job security at Teleperformance in Enniskillen after a contract to provide services to the Student Loans Company was withdrawn from Enniskillen and sent to the company’s Newry office.

A staff member, who wished to remain anonymous, contacted The Impartial Reporter claiming that around 13 staff were recently hired at the Enniskillen office to work on the Student Loan Company contract. It is understood that, after two weeks, those who had been hired through an agency were let go and the remaining staff were told they would be working on the existing Liberty Insurance contract.

An email sent to staff from Teleperformance’s Northern Ireland Operations Director Stephen Morrow said the contract was moved to Newry because it is an existing Teleperformance site and “has the necessary infrastructure and management team to support the aggressive timelines that this project requires.”

In the email – which had a subject line ‘SLC withdrawn from Enniskillen’ – Mr. Morrow said: “As additional business opportunities present themselves we will continue to consider them for deployment across all centres available to us.”

READ: Council to quiz firm over its promise to create 800 jobs in Enniskillen

This development comes three months after local Councillors called on the company to explain if it still intends to create the 800 jobs it promised amid a blaze of publicity in 2015.

Teleperformance is a leading outsourced customer service management company with centres in Bangor, Newry and Enniskillen, in addition to a number of centres in Britain. The company took over the Liberty Insurance contract at the Carran Business Park offices in 2015 and said it intended to create 800 new jobs by 2018.

Invest NI offered £2.5 million of support towards the project and the Department of Employment and Learning offered £249,500 of support. The then Enterprise Minister Arlene Foster said she was proud and delighted to have played a part in bringing Teleperformance to Fermanagh.

READ: 800 new jobs for Enniskillen

It has emerged that the company has been mainly focused on retaining the 200 existing jobs at the site.

A letter from Invest NI Chief Executive Alastair Hamilton to Fermanagh and Omagh District Council at the end of 2017 described the Teleperformance project as being “of strategic importance to Enniskillen and the wider Fermanagh and Omagh District Council area.”

Mr. Hamilton wrote: “You will be aware that around the time of this project Liberty insurance finalised an agreement with Teleperformance to manage and operate their contact centre in Enniskillen which resulted in the retention of around 200 jobs. This separate project is going particularly well, employment has grown and I understand that the company is pleased with the quality of the workforce in the area.”
Mr. Hamilton said “Teleperformance remains committed to Fermanagh and we continue to work closely with the local management team to help the company deliver its expansion plans.”

He did not reveal how much of the £2.5 million has been drawn down to date. Instead, Mr. Hamilton said: “When an offer is made it is based on the company reaching agreed targets and milestones before any monies are released. Payments are only made when a company demonstrates it has reached these milestones. Employment projects are often over a three-five year period. As jobs are created the company draws down against our offer of support. We monitor company progress closely against our letter of offer both while the project is live, and for a period after. Due to the potential for commercial detriment we do not release progress against job creation while a project is still live.”

The Impartial Reporter contacted Mr. Morrow but the company had not responded at the time of going to press.