Holiday firm cuts costs with outsourcer switch

TUI UK sees savings after moving helpdesk contract from IBM to Wipro

Travel group TUI UK has reduced annual support costs by 20 per cent after moving its outsourced helpdesk contract from IBM to Wipro.

Under the £5m, five-year deal signed at the end of 2004, TUI UK’s support calls are dealt with by a Wipro-run call centre in Chennai, India, covering 13,000 desktops and 300 servers in 800 UK shops and offices.

‘We needed a model that would allow us to adjust the services we received depending on the time of year,’ said TUI UK’s IT director, Keith Newman.

But offshoring support has not been without its problems, says Newman.

‘In the early stages we did have some problems with Wipro staff in terms of accent, and we had to go through a fairly rigorous process with Wipro,’ he said.

‘But the first-time fixes are vastly up on what was in place before, and feedback from the business is fairly quiet, which I take as a positive indication.

‘With the previous service provider there was a lot of noise and dissatisfaction.’

Newman says the IBM contract used short-term contractors that did not build up knowledge of the holiday firm’s business.