America's Delta Airlines, the world's largest airline, has announced to close down its Indian call centres, in a decision the carrier's officials say was driven by poor customer feedback.
This could come as a major setback to India's flourishing call centres which provide employment to thousands of youths across the country. Delta's call in India was handled by a call centre of Wipro Ltd.
Media reports said Richard Anderson, the airline's chief executive, told employees in a recorded message on Thursday night that Delta had stopped forwarding calls to India in the first quarter and would be bringing the function back in-house in the US.
"The customer acceptance of call centers in foreign countries is low and our customers were not shy about letting us have that feedback," Anderson said.
A Delta spokesman, was quoted as saying by The Boston Globe that the airlines has hired about 4,500 call-center workers in the US after it ended its current outsourcing operations in India.
However, Delta's call centres in Jamaica and South Africa would continue, thespokesman said.
In February, United Airlines too had announced to end its 165 overseas call centre jobs.
After the merger of the North West Airlines, Delta is now the world's largest carrier. It had sent its call centres to India in 2002 to save money, which at that time was estimated to be about $25 million a year.