Pfosten fünf║--Assignment 3

AOL or America Online - offers services such as Internet access, email account, instant messaging, chat, and other online features.

The online giant AOL announced last October 18, 2006 that it is closing its Albuquerque call center, a move expected to result in the loss of more than 900 jobs by the end of December. It’s really difficult news. The cuts are part of a restructuring plan AOL announced in August, in which the company said as many as 5,000 employees would be laid off within six months - a quarter of its global work force. Albuquerque's call center at 6301 Jefferson St. N.E. employs more than 900 workers. The company wouldn't disclose the typical salary paid in Albuquerque, only saying it was "on par with the industry." Employees were told of the layoffs, and then given the day off. They will continue to work for AOL through Dec. 15, after which they will be offered a severance package that provides a combination of salary and benefits.

In total, AOL announced 1,400 job cuts in the United States. A call center in Tucson will also see about 400 job cuts, while a call center in Ogden, Utah, will be sold to another company. The reduction in customer service workers comes as AOL, a unit of Time Warner Inc., transitions away from charging customers for high-speed Internet, e-mail and other services and into an advertising-driven Web services company. Customers who have been maintaining their AOL subscription just to keep their AOL.com e-mail address, for example, now receive that service online for free.

AOL has maintained a call center in Albuquerque for about a decade. The Albuquerque facility was one of AOL's first customer call centers and remains its second-largest, falling just behind a call center in Oklahoma City that will remain open. The Albuquerque call center employees worked with subscribers to answer questions on high-speed Internet connections, billing issues, registration to the service and other areas of technical support. But with the company moving away from its subscriber-driven service, the need for customer service workers has minimized.

In August, Time Warner Inc., AOL's parent company, said it expected to spend $250 million to $350 million through 2007 to implement the changes, about half of that for employee severance. The AOL cuts are the latest in a series of work force fluctuations in the Albuquerque area's call centers, which employ an estimated 12,500 people in the metro area. Sento Corp., a customer support company in Utah, in August announced 65 job cuts after its Downtown call center lost a key client. The company, though, employs about 300 at the Compass Bank building and has said it still plans to expand to 800 workers in the next three years. Verizon Wireless is in the midst of hiring as many 400 customer service call center workers by the end of the year to fill a new, $20 million facility at 7000 Central Ave. S.W. that at its peak will hold 1,400 workers.

AOL's departure means more than just job losses. The company was an advocate for Albuquerque as a home for corporate customer relations centers. The departure from Albuquerque is strictly due to AOL's change in business model. It has nothing to do with the viability of the local market or other economic factors.


reference:
[http://www.abqtrib.com/news/2006/oct/18/aol-closing-its-albuquerque-call-center/]
Company Website:
[www.aol.com]
[www.albuquerque.oodle.com]