UPS to close Tallaght centre

Parcel delivery firm UPS is to close its call centre operations in Tallaght over the coming months with the loss of 200 jobs.

In a statement this evening the company said the reasons for the closure were increasing difficulties finding staff with the required language skills and the “increasing costs year on year of running the operation” in Tallaght.

It said 60 staff would be relocated to other UPS operations in Dublin with the remainder made redundant.

UPS said the reduction in staffing would take place on a phased basis starting in October and ending in May next year. The company said the closure of the Tallaght site would have no impact on customers.

Nigel Goodson, human resources director for UPS UK & Ireland, said the decision was regrettable, but “unavoidable”.

The Tallaght call centre answers inquiries from customers in France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Ireland, parts of Switzerland, and parts of the UK.

Fine Gael Dublin South West TD Brian Hayes said the news was "devastating" and that it would come as an additional blow to the Dublin 24 area, which had seen a rise of 89 per cent in unemployment between July 2008 and July 2009.

"The UPS decision of today will pile more pressure, in respect of the unemployment crisis, on Dublin 24. What is crucial now is for a major re-skilling package to be put together for the workers in UPS supported by the company and the employment related agencies."

Labour Party TD for Dublin South West, Pat Rabbitte, Labour TD for Dublin South West said if it was true that language skills were in short supply that this "would appear to raise questions about our policy towards call centres generally".

"A very high proportion of the staff, perhaps over 80 per cent are non-national. Together with available indigenous Irish it is difficult to understand why there should be difficulty finding employees with the appropriate language skills.

"This is very unwelcome news and the large number of people losing their jobs warrants intervention at government level to establish if the deficiencies can be corrected within the 12 months."