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300 Jobs Heading To India, Manila

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By MICHAEL SASSO

msasso@tampatrib.com

Published: October 25, 2008

Updated: 10/25/2008 12:17 am

TAMPA - JPMorgan Chase said Friday it plans to lay off 300 people from its Seffner Treasury and Securities Services campus and shift the work to offices in the Philippines and India.

Such "off-shoring" of work is one of three layoff notices the New York-based bank revealed this week.

On Thursday, the company announced it is cutting 93 jobs in Tampa as it consolidates its education finance division in Indianapolis. The company also is cutting 75 jobs in its Tampa wholesale mortgage division because of changes in the mortgage market, although the bank notified those employees a few months ago.

JPMorgan Chase currently has 3,800 Tampa-area employees. Combined, those three layoff actions will result in at least 468 employees in the Tampa area losing their jobs. The cuts do not affect Washington Mutual employees, who joined the company when JPMorgan Chase recently acquired Washington Mutual.

JPMorgan Chase spokeswoman Nancy Norris said the bank routinely monitors its operations for efficiency. It decided to move some of the work being performed at its Treasury and Securities Services division at the Highland Oaks business park in Seffner to Manila and Mumbai. The company already has employees in those two Asian cities performing similar functions to those done in Tampa, Norris said.

However, Tampa will remain the hub for the bank's Treasury and Securities Services division, she said.

"We're there for the long-term," she said. "Tampa and the Highland Oaks facility is part of our long-term strategy."

The company notified the 300 employees Thursday. They work in a variety of jobs but generally assist in the transfer of money around the world, Norris said. Salaries vary, but a typical salary for affected employees is $35,000 to $40,000. She did not have information about the salaries of the Indian or Filipino employees who will be assigned the work. The job cuts will be made over the next 14 months, and employees will be offered severance payments and job placement assistance, she said.

The decision to move the work overseas, which is often done to reduce costs, was done to improve efficiency and was not done in conjunction with the global financial crisis or JPMorgan Chase's acquisition of Washington Mutual, Norris said.

JPMorgan Chase opened its three-building campus in the Highland Oaks business park in January 2001. This is at least the second large layoff at JPMorgan Chase in recent years. In January 2005, the company announced that it would cut about 1,900 jobs at its credit card operations center in Tampa over the course of 2005. Those previous layoffs were tied to the company's acquisition of Bank One, rather than off-shoring of work.

Some other financial services firms also have moved work overseas recently, including a back-office division of Coca-Cola Enterprises, a company that produces and distributes Coca-Cola products. CCE announced this summer that it would cut 150 jobs in Brandon and move the work to India, Guatemala or Poland.

JPMorgan Chase has received at least $5.38 million in tax refunds through the state's Qualified Target Industries incentive program for creating nearly 1,500 jobs in its treasury division, according to Hillsborough County records. On Friday, Norris said the company has complied with all requirements for the incentive program.

The ability to lure financial services jobs, such as JPMorgan Chase's, has been a source of pride for the community and allowed the Tampa Bay area to start using the nickname "Wall Street South." Chris Steinocher, chief operating officer of the Tampa Bay Partnership, a local economic development organization, said he wasn't surprised to hear of the off-shoring news.

In recent years, financial services companies have started moving even higher-end professional jobs overseas, where they started just outsourcing customer service jobs, Steinocher said. Local economic development officials continue to recruit financial service jobs, even though they could be moved overseas, but try to attract a broad base of industries to minimize that risk, he said.

Reporter Michael Sasso can be reached at (813) 259-7865.

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