Australian telco to offshore 150 jobs to Mumbai

Australian mobile phone retailer Crazy John's is reportedly offshoring about 150 jobs to Mumbai where its parent company Vodafone Hutchison Australia (VHA) operates a call centre.

According to 'The Australian', around 200 employees of Crazy John's will face redundancy as part of its restructuring programme in the first half of 2010, when over 150 jobs will be shifted to Mumbai.

The remaining staff of Crazy John's that will be made redundant later would initially come from finance, credit management and customer relations departments, sources said.

"Their tasks would be absorbed by VHA," sources said.

Crazy John's unit and mobile virtual network operator GRLmobile is a prepaid service aimed at the female youth market.

In August, company executives dismissed talk of GRLmobile's impending demise describing it as pure rumour.

Crazy John's Chief Executive Brendan Fleiter had said GRLmobile's sales channels -- Australia Post, Kmart, Target, Dick Smith and Crazy John's -- would increase over the next few months.

Crazy John's employees fear that VHA's Sydney-centric management is intent on wiping the slate clean and consolidating its operations under one roof.

A VHA spokesman declined to comment on possible retrenchments, saying "it's business as usual at Crazy John's".