Lloyds TSB is to transfer up to 250 permanent IT staff, at the risk of redundancy, and 200 contractor roles to India. The bank said the staff is part of its IT division's technical delivery function, where they design and develop software, and will start moving from June.
This move will impact the bank's staff in London, Manchester, Birmingham, Cardiff, Bristol, Haywards Heath, Gloucester, Andover, Edinburgh and Brighton.
However, according to a statement released by the bank revealed that though Lloyds have announced the plans to offshore up to 250 permanent IT roles, but it wants to keep those staff within the group by guaranteeing them the offer of another job with the group.
The Lloyds TSB Group's employee union, Unite, too has slammed the bank's plans. Unite say that the decision by Lloyds TSB to cut jobs from their IT function is unjustified and represents a lack of faith in the IT skills of their U.K. workforce.
"Unite is disappointed by the offshoring announcement. We have an offshoring agreement with LTSB which states that the union will be consulted before any offshoring decisions are made and that there will be no compulsory redundancies. We do not believe that the business case for this decision has been made; we are challenging the bank to consider alternative options," said John Bancroft, a Unite Official. "We will be working to ensure that staff in the bank is offered suitable alternative employment and that their terms and conditions are protected."
Lloyds has exported up to 3,000 UK jobs to India since 2003.
