Vodafone axes 375 UK jobs

 

Gallery

By Stuart Turton

Posted on 10 Mar 2010 at 10:40

Vodafone has announced plans to lay off 375 jobs beginning later this month.

The company claimed the jobs were "primarily in back-office functions" including administration, human resources and finance, and that it would hire 170 staff in "customer-facing roles".

The operator is also planning to add a further 50 staff in September as part of its graduate scheme. "We're committed to increasing the number of customer-facing employees, which will help us simplify our business and continue to deliver outstanding communications services," said Vodafone human resources chief Matthew Brearley.

The Communication Workers Union claimed it was disappointed by the job cuts, and cast doubt on the company's promises.

We’re not sure that the current information coming from the company regarding redundancies is entirely accurate

"We’re not sure that the current information coming from the company regarding redundancies is entirely accurate," said Andy Kerr, CWU deputy general secretary.

"There are rumours that jobs will be lost from Vodafone sites in Stoke and Warrington and these are both customer-facing operations, while Vodafone has implied that customer-facing roles will be expanded.

"We’d like to see greater clarity from the company on how this decision will affect staff, a willingness to explore redeployment opportunities and greater assurances about a voluntary approach to redundancies," he concluded.

This is the second wave of job cuts from Vodafone, which cut 500 jobs in February 2009.