Retailer cites rising costs and competition for offshore move.

 

Officeworks will move several hundred locally based jobs to India and the Philippines as part of the retailer's $15 million cost-saving restructure, which had been previously flagged after the company’s sluggish half-yearly results.

 

Parent company Wesfarmers informed dozens of staff at its call centre in Western Sydney last  week that their roles were now redundant and announced the team would be replaced with a centre in Manila.

 

The technology support business Geeks2U as well as other office roles in Sydney and Melbourne will be moved to Bengaluru, India, in coming months.

 

In a statement, a spokesperson for the business said "rising costs, increasing competition and rapidly changing customer expectations" had forced it to undergo a significant strategy change, so it could continue offering customers low prices.

 

Communications sent to staff said the company would also start using more AI, automation and data to improve efficiency and decision-making.

 

University of Sydney international business professor Vikas Kumar told the ABC that the trend to offshore more "high-value" jobs, such as those helping to build AI, reflected a lack of skills in Australia.

 

"It just makes more sense to do it in countries such as India where you have this kind of talent,” he said.

 

The change is being overseen by managing director John Gualtieri, who took over as head of Officeworks last year after finishing a stint as chief executive of Wesfarmers companies Kmart and Target.

 

Those two businesses also have 500 people working in business and technology jobs at its "global capability centre" in Bengaluru.

 

PHOTO; Reuters