Cheap Tickets, Honolulu, will open its fifth call center in Tampa, FL, in July. The center will be the company's first on the East Coast. Its four other centers are in Honolulu; Los Angeles; Lakeport, CA; and Colorado Springs, CO. Cheap Tickets, which sells discount travel products, said it plans to staff the Tampa center with 100 employees by fall. The new center will have a capacity for 400 workers. The company said it has experienced an increase in call volume from increased business because of its marketing efforts and needed a new call center to expand its call capacity. Cheap Tickets call centers handle an average of 22,000 calls daily.
In other Call Center news:
Cingular Wireless, Atlanta, announced plans to restructure its Baton Rouge, LA, call center earlier this month in an expansion that will create 450 jobs over the next two years. The call center's focus will shift primarily to customer care and technical support. The center's existing 180-employee staff will be able to transfer to new service positions or apply for technical support jobs. A company official said Cingular, a wireless service provider, decided to maintain its Baton Rouge presence because of the area's quality labor force.
Intercallnet, Fort Lauderdale, FL, last month brought a new customer contact center online at its headquarters. Details of the size and staffing of the contact center were not disclosed. Intercallnet, a customer relationship management outsourced provider, said the new center was designed to meet the multimedia communication needs of its clients.
Namzero, Los Gatos, CA, opened a call center in Vancouver, British Columbia, earlier this month. The company, which provides domain registration, Web hosting and management services, said the new center was part of its continuing investment in customer support, including an increased support staff, new response technology and live phone support. Further details about the new center were not disclosed.
West Corp., Omaha, NE, has opened a new contact center in Harlingen, TX. The 18,000-square-foot center began operations earlier this month. It creates 300 new jobs in the area and has an estimated payroll of $4 million. The location was picked for its quality bilingual work force, said Mark Lavin, president of West's operator teleservices division. Earlier this year, West, an outsourced teleservices provider, opened a 35,000-square-foot, 1,000-employee call center in Beaumont, TX.
