Bad timing by Barclays

Barclaycard announced today that they are cutting 630 call centre jobs. Some of these (200 according to Amicus) will be offshored to India.

You have to wonder about the bright spark who came up with the timing of this announcement.

Barclaycard is struggling – a couple of weeks ago it announced that profits were down a massive 40% in 2006. But any sympathy the public may have felt for the card giant was tempered by the knowledge that Barclays as a whole made a £7 billion profit last year – up 35%.

The uproar that has greeted the huge profits posted by UK banks in the last few weeks will only be intensified by news that an arm of one of the biggest and richest is prepared to put hundreds of people out of work in order to save a few quid.

Last week Lloyds TSB managed to get the PR right by announcing that it was closing its Mumbai call centre. All callers to their PhoneBank will now speak to someone in the UK. The fact that no new jobs are created by this move didn’t stop the press portraying the move as a victory for the British worker.

Customers have traditionally stuck with their bank through thick and thin but this is changing. Recent research by financial comparison outfit Fool.co.uk shows that four out of five people are prepared to switch over penalty charges.

Axing jobs after you post record profits may just provide people with an extra incentive to look elsewhere for their banking needs.