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Mr. Shaun Wallis, CEO of HSBC Bank Malta announced on Thursday afternoon that HSBC UK has approved a substantial capital investment of 7 million Euro for the setting up of a Global Call Centre in Malta, subject to final Agreements with the Malta Government and the granting of the necessary permits.
Apart from the initial capital expenditure, the annual recurring operating costs are estimated to be around Euro 7 million. HSBC will be approaching local suppliers to tender for works, services and equipment in May.
The call centre will commence its operations before the end of this year, and is expected to employ up to 350 new employees on a mix of full and part-time employment. HSBC will consider the feasibility to expand the operation further towards the end of 2007.
This investment will ensure the training in new skills for hundreds of Maltese in a very important sector regarding those who may not have achieved tertiary education but are more suited for a white collar job rather than working in a factory. Moreover, given the prevalence of part-time and flexi-time work in Call Centres, HSBC may offer opportunities for housewives to earn money through part-time employment.
The Call Centre, which will be a 200 agent operation, will initially operate from 08:00 to 22:00 peak UK time, on a 14 hour day basis, 7 days a week. There is the possibility that the hours of operation may be extended.
The calls that will be handled in Malta will cater for the growing customer demand for HSBC’s UK telephony based services and will not adversely affect other Call Centre traffic in the UK or other Global sites.
This decision follows an extensive pilot carried out over the last few months with agents trained to handle high-value calls from customers of HSBC UK. Apart from language and understanding skills, the pilot project also evaluated the level of banking knowledge of the Maltese employees, their ability to learn new skills, their productivity levels and their level of UK cultural understanding.
"Malta’s performance was extremely good in terms of UK customer satisfaction, call handling and clearly evidenced the capability of HSBC’s Maltese employees to provide a quality customer service on an international basis", said Mr. Wallis.
Dr Lawrence Gonzi, Prime Minister, added, that "This fits in perfectly with Government’s vision that Malta does indeed have a successful role to play in the new globalised economy based on the excellent language and ICT skills of the Maltese."
Dr Alec A Mizzi, Chairman of Malta Enterprise, said that Malta is an idea location for call centers due to the common language between both countries and in addition Malta Enterprise could offer investment tax credits under the Business Promotion Act which could amount to as much as 60 per cent of the investment made or of the wage costs involved. This is part of the overall attraction of Malta as a centre for Business Process Outsourcing (BPO). Malta Enterprise was involved in the setting up of this opportunity.
Chairman of HSBC Bank Malta, Mr. Albert Mizzi, said that "To attract this global business to Malta, it was necessary to demonstrate that there was a high level of customer service orientation, good language skills and a strong sales and work ethic, which we have been able to do".
© Copyright 2006 - MaltaMedia Online Network
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