Tesco to shutter Cardiff call centre, 1,100 jobs at risk

The grocer’s Cardiff call centre, which employees 1,100 staff, is set for closure next February in an initiative to cut costs at the business.

The retailer plans to consolidate its call centre operations at its Dundee site, resulting in 250 new roles.

The supermarket giant, which cancelled a slew of online deliveries earlier this week following an IT glitch, is to begin consultation talks with staff that will be affected in the coming weeks.

UK chief executive Matt Davies said: “The retail sector is facing unprecedented challenges and we must ensure we run our business in a sustainable and cost-effective way, while meeting the changing needs of our customers.

“To help us achieve this, we’ve taken the difficult decision to close our customer service operations in Cardiff.

“We realise this will have a significant effect on colleagues in the Cardiff area, and our priority now is to continue to do all we can to support them at this time.”

Fewer, better jobs

These job cuts are the latest in a slew of restructures at Tesco, which posted another rise in like-for-like sales in its first quarter earlier this month.

The grocer slashed approximately 1,700 deputy manager roles across its convenience stores in February and unveiled plans to axe 24-hour openings at a tranche of its stores in April, impacting 3,300 store staff.

The move to ’fewer, better jobs’ is impacting many retailers across the industry.

Grocery rival Waitrose put 180 store management level jobs at risk in February as part of a move to simplify the structure within its 350 stores while stablemate John Lewis is axing almost 400 jobs amid “structural changes”, with further cuts on the horizon.