US Airways Returns Positions to Twin City

http://triangle.news14.com/content/local_news/648965/us-airways-returns-positions-to-twin-city

WINSTON-SALEM -- US Airways is returning 400 call center jobs sent overseas several years ago back to the United States. Half of the jobs will be filled at its reservations center in Winston-Salem, the other half divided between centers in Phoenix and Reno.

"We are excited about the jobs coming back from Manila,” said Vonda Hardy, president of Local 3640 of the Communications Workers of America. “It is a great, great day."

It's been a busy last couple of weeks at the CWA local as the union helps new hires get their feet on the ground. The positions they're filling once belonged to workers who took early buyouts and were off-shored to Manila and other foreign cities with the union's agreement. This, after US Airways filed bankruptcy in 2004 for the second time in two years.

"The union at that time made a diligent effort to be able to save and retain as much in the contract as we could faced with the economic times," said Hardy.

The airline's part of the deal was to protect the remaining positions and eventually route all reservations calls made in the U.S. to U.S. call centers only.

"You will be able to outsource them with the knowledge of knowing that you have to bring the jobs back and that contingency was October 31 of 2011 and that has happened," Hardy said.

With unemployment in Winston-Salem still high, it's good news for the Twin City.

"There are a lot of people in this area who have customer service skills. So, they won't have any trouble finding really talented people,” said Gayle Anderson, president of the Winston-Salem Chamber of Commerce. “It will just help put people back to work who have lost their jobs at other companies."

Hardy said while as a union official she was pleased to see the jobs return to the U.S. and to Winston-Salem she believed customers on the other end of the phone line would be pleased, as well.

"A lot of people when they were calling and getting outsourced you know immediately you've got an outsourced city,” she said. “The customer is going to see they're calling the United States and they're getting the United States."