400 call centre jobs coming to Windsor
Hinduja Global Solutions has announced it will be opening a new call centre in Windsor and are looking to hire 400 people for different position.
The company held a job fair in the city in the fall of 2013 from which they gathered 1,600 applications.
"We quickly realized that the residents of Windsor will be loyal and high performing ambassadors for us as their employer," said Kathy Follett-Lloyd, Vice President of Human Resources with HGS Canada in a press release Tuesday.
"The partnerships forged with city leaders in the mayor’s office and the office of economic development further cemented our decision to choose Windsor as the 11th location for HGS Canada."
Follett-Lloyd said they will be reviewing applications in the near future.
The Windsor Essex Economic Development Corporation has been courting the tech company for months.
"We have a big opportunity for 400 people to be working full-time and we believe that that's the start," said Sandra Pupatello, the CEO of the WEEDC. "HGS has a very good track record. Once they come into a community they tend to stay and tend to grow."
The CEO of the Unemployed Help Centre said the region needs jobs.
"I can't say I can remember when an announcement was made that we're going to have 400 jobs," she said. That's a lot of employment."
At the time of the job fair in 2013 Mayor Eddie Francis encouraged people to attend calling the employment "stable and steady" and part of "a good company."
The jobs then were advertised as full-time with a pay start about $11 an hour.
“HGS will be a welcomed addition to the City of Windsor," said Mayor Eddie Francis in Tuesday's press release. "We have been working closely with HGS and I am pleased to welcome their respected customer service centre brand to the city.”
Pupatello said the company will be up and running within the first quarter of 2015.
'10 years ago, nobody would have really noticed'
Meanwhile, Western University economist Mike Moffatt said it's a good news story.
"I do think it speaks to the depth of the economic decline where we get excited about minimum wage jobs coming to the city," he said. "I think 10 years ago, nobody would have really noticed an announcement like this or paid much attention to it."
Moffatt also said the job market is slowly beginning to pick up in southwestern Ontario, but it may be awhile before better-paying jobs are widely available.
"We are not going to see overall wage increases until we can get a lot of unemployed people back to work and have companies fighting for workers, rather than throw out an ad and have all these people will to work for any price."
