Dive Brief:
- Waste Management announced it will close a call center in Oak Harbor, WA. The company employs approximately 120 workers at the center.
- The work previously performed at the center will be assimilated by the employees at a different branch located in Phoenix, AZ, while contractors will fill in the rest of the void.
- The waste and recycling giant has shuttered a number of smaller-sized call centers as the company consolidates its customer-service related operations into larger facilities.
Dive Insight:
The call center is scheduled to close in September 2014. Robin Freedman, Waste Management’s Washington spokesperson declined to comment in detail about the layoffs, but did say “as a company, we have a fiduciary responsibility to our stakeholders, we’re very concerned about our budgets.”
At the beginning of 2014, the company pulled the plug on its investments in startups in order to reduce its financial risk. In November 2013, CEO David Steiner made waves when he said the recycling industry needed to re-think its strategy in order to become profitable.