More jobs as Southend is named call centre of the UK

1:00am Thursday 4th December 2008

By Geoff Percival

EVERY day we are confronted with headlines of job losses as companies suffer in the recession.

Call centre Converso, however, is bucking the bad news trend, by expanding its Southend base, creating 400 new jobs over the next two years, 180 immediately.

It has been a phenomenal rise for Converso, which has its headquarters in Thamesgate House, Victoria Avenue, Southend.

It aims to develop Converso contact centres across the world with Southend as its flagship.

The company decided to invest heavily in Southend, due to the calibre of the workforce available.

Prashant Jhawar, Usha Martin vice-chairman, said: “We know Southend is the call centre capital of the United Kingdom and the way staff have worked for us over the past year illustrates this.

“Only a couple of months after we walked in the door, the firm’s biggest clients walked out, but in a short time, we were back in profit and now we are able to announce this big expansion and even look to expand offshore in the future.

“One thing which is definite, however, is that Southend will always be the hub of our operations and we intend to continue with expansion here.

“As we develop Converso into a worldwide brand, then staff in various countries will be able to learn from each other.”

He said: “The opening of the new floor of our call centre demonstrates our commitment to Southend and recognises the calibre of labour available locally.”

Southend Council’s Conservative leader Nigel Holdcroft believes the fact a multi-national company is keen to invest in Southend shows regeneration efforts in the town are paying off.

He said: “At the present time with the financial climate, new jobs being created is always good news and we hope we can develop good quality jobs in Southend in the future.”

The expansion of Converso marks the latest development in a long line, which has firmly placed Southend as the call centre capital of the UK.

It started back in the 1970s when the Pye group finally announced the closure of its Ekco subsidiary in Priory Crescent, Southend.

At the same time, a group of major banks were setting up a joint operation, the Access Credit Card Company, to combat the growing success of Barclaycard.

With the Ekco offices conveniently available, Access chose to make its headquarters in Southend.

As the business grew, more and more staff were trained which made Southend a growing area to set up new call centres.

In the end, the Access company also took over Esplanade House on the seafront from the old North Thames Gas Board as its business grew.

This encouraged other banking operations to follow suit and come to Southend including HSBC and Lloyds TSB.

Access was later taken over by the Royal Bank of Scotland, which now has a new purpose-built headquarters near the Tesco superstore in Prince Avenue, Westcliff.

Seven years ago, RBS considered relocating to Gloucester. However, it was both the availability of the central site near Tesco and the experience of the workforce in Southend, which tipped the scales in favour of the town.

There still seems to be plenty of demand for the skills which were created in Southend nearly 40 years ago.

Electricity supply company Eon is continuing to expand its centre in the old Eastern Electricity Board offices in London Road, Rayleigh.