Christmas job cuts as Chorus upgrades IT
Network company Chorus says ‘‘tens’’ of staff will lose their jobs in a restructure.
A source said chief executive Kate McKenzie had told staff in an email that the NZX-listed company needed to become a smaller business and that the cuts would take effect shortly before Christmas, on December 8.
Chorus spokesman Nathan Beaumont confirmed the restructure but said speculation that as many as 200 jobs might go was incorrect.
As Chorus was still consulting on the changes, it was not possible to give exact numbers, he said.
The Wellington-based firm employed 1032 permanent staff as of the end of June.
The source said the staff changes would mean Chorus would provide less ‘‘proactive’’ support for its internet-provider customers, instead offering help only when they asked for it.
However, Beaumont said the cuts had flowed from the deployment of new informationtechnology systems that integrated Chorus’ systems ‘‘directly with retail service providers’’.
‘‘Customers get a better experience and we are able to streamline our operations. Unfortunately that means we will not need as many people as we have now.’’
Job numbers may also coming down at Spark.
Spark managing director Simon Moutter said it achieved a 31 per cent year-on-year drop in the number of incoming calls to its contact centres in October.
That was thanks to automation and its move away from a troubled email outsourcing arrangement with Yahoo. be
But Moutter said job reductions that flowed from the efficiency gains were likely to be achieved through natural attrition rather than redundancies.
Since contact centre employees tended to stay only a relatively short time in their roles, it would simply be a case of Spark advertising fewer vacancies, he said.
Chorus is due to finish laying ultrafast broadband in 192 cities and towns by the end of 2022.
Although it will still have work to do after that co-ordinating the connection of homes and maintaining its networks, the company has begun to look for future opportunities.
This month it agreed to wire up all the classrooms in 10 schools in the Far North and Gisborne with gigabit fibre-optic access points, as part of an agreement with Crownowned education technology company N4L.
Chorus and N4L are also running a trial with Haeata Community Campus in Christchurch that will extend the school’s internet service out into the homes of students.