(10 October 2006 – Australia) ANZ has threatened legal action against News Limited for articles in its publications stating that ANZ is looking to shift call centre jobs offshore.The move followed a front page story in the Daily Telegraph saying ANZ had established customer call centres in India, despite ANZ saying it had written to the Telegraph a week earlier denying the accusations.
ANZ chief executive officer John McFarlane said the bank had a “clear policy” that all call centres for Australian customers would remain in Australia.
“We are incredibly disappointed that having put this policy in place to reflect the community’s interest in maintaining call centres in Australia that the Daily Telegraph should choose to misrepresent us,” he said.
“For example, the picture shown on page one is not a customer call centre, it is ANZ’s technology centre,” McFarlane said.
ANZ has run its own tech centre in Bangalore since 1989, employing some 1400 people, most of whom work in software development.
McFarlane said the bank needed to develop its capability in Bangalore to remain competitive, allowing ANZ to grow its business in Australia.
He also said that customer records were held in data centres in Australia and would remain there.