TUI UK reduces annual support costs after switchover to Wipro

London, Mar 2 (UNI) British travel group TUI UK has reduced annual support costs by 20 per cent after moving its outsourced helpdesk contract from IBM to Wipro in a 5 million pound deal.

Under the five-year deal signed at the end of 2004, TUI UK's support calls are dealt by a Wipro-run call centre in Chennai, 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,'' TUI UK's IT director Keith Newman said.

Speaking about offshoring problems, Mr Newman said, ''In the early stages we did have some problems with the Wipro staff in terms of accent, and we had to go through a fairly rigorous process with them. 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.

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