CallTech Communications, LLC, a Columbus, Ohio-based firm, will begin
recruiting employees in April.
ALBANY - A Columbus, Ohio-based call center company plans to set up
business in Albany by June 1, injecting 166 new jobs into the region.
Lt. Gov. Mark Taylor, D-Albany, made the announcement Monday, saying the
state has pledged $1 million in OneGeorgia funds to help finance
technical equipment needed by CallTech Communications, LLC.
The call center will be located in a 21,000-square-foot facility that is
part of the former Wal-Mart building at 2707 Dawson Road.
"This type of investment is important to the economy," Taylor said. Any
time you create more than 150 jobs in southwest Georgia in the midst of
an economic recession nationally, it's a phenomenal achievement. This
will have a positive impact on the region's economy."
Bob Massey, chairman of the board of CallTech, said he hopes to have a
manager on site by June 1. The company also hopes to begin recruiting
employees by the middle of April and training them by May 1. Operations
will begin June 1, Massey predicted.
Salaries will begin at around $8 an hour for untrained, entry-level
positions and go higher depending on experience and job description. The
company also has attendance bonuses and referral bonuses, as well as a
401(k) plan and health, dental and vision coverage, Massey said.
"Our No. 1 challenge is people," Massey said. "I ask each of you to send
people to CallTech. We need high quality, highly trained people... We
take care of our people."
C.J. Petitti, CallTech's CEO, said the company will offer in-house
training and training through the state's QuickStart program at Albany
Technical College.
BellSouth will be the first client served at the Albany location.
Workers with CallTech here will provide technical support for
BellSouth's Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) service.
Calltech staffers will be trained to help BellSouth's DSL users by
troubleshooting problems they encounter with their high-speed Internet
service.
The company's other clients include casual clothing retailer Abercrombie
& Fitch, telecommunications giant Worldcom, computer storage provider
Iomega, Universal Studios Florida and Priceline.com.
CallTech provides a variety of services for those clients including:
- Customer service and technical support
- Information request, reservations and transactions
- Membership sign-up and enrollment for various associations and
services
- Third-party verification for telephone and utility services
- Sales for various goods and services
- Cancellation "rescue" services attempting to keep customers
- E-mail response, staffed and/or automated
- Real-time customer service-technical support instant messaging
(chat)
- Bulk fax and e-mail.
"We're an inbound call center," Petitti said. "We're not the ones that
call you at home at night and bother you, so you can relax about that."
"This is the most sophisticated type of call center you can have in your
community," Taylor said.
Albany will house the fifth call center for the company. Two centers are
in Columbus, Ohio, one in Brownsville, Pa., and one in Fort Myers, Fla.
"We're delighted to have CallTech because it broadens the venue for
Albany in the e-commerce world," said Jeff "Bodine" Sinyard, chairman of
the Albany-Dougherty Economic Development Commission.
"A project of this description is in line with the type of industry that
we have targeted for several years," he said.
CallTech has been looking at sites in Tennessee and Kentucky for its
fifth call center before Georgia began its recruitment.
R.K. Sehgal, commissioner of Georgia Department of Industry and Trade,
visited the company in early January and made his sales pitch. CallTech
managers then visited four sites in Georgia before picking Albany.
"We allocated an hour and 20 minutes for each stop," Petitti said.
"Albany was the second stop. We had such a good feeling here that it was
hard to go on to the other stops.
"We kept an open mind but circled back through here on our way back to
Atlanta."
Petitti was complimentary of the sales presentation by Albany Area
Chamber of Commerce President Tim Martin and Linda Moore of the Economic
Development Commission staff.
"The incentives were not the deciding factor," Petitti said. "All states
offer incentives. It was the people who made the difference - and the
availability of a good work force. We have to have trained people who
show up for work. If they don't, our callers get a busy signal."
Martin said the company will operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Typically, call centers receive most calls during the 4 pm-midnight
shift, Martin said.
"That's when people are at home and on the Internet," Martin said.
Sinyard also complimented Tim O'Neill Jr. of Vanguard Associates, an
Atlanta company that purchased the former Wal-Mart building, for his
work in accommodating Albany's recruitment of CallTech.
"Tim's one of the few folks who will let you start tearing down walls
before you have a signed contract," Sinyard said.
O'Neill said negotiations continue with three national chains for the
remainder of the retail space in the building. Hobby Lobby has committed
to 61,000 square feet.
There is about 40,000 square feet remaining. O'Neill said all of the
companies he has negotiated with are comfortable with leasing space in
the building with a call center as a neighbor.
Martin, when asked by The Albany Herald, said you have to go back about
a decade before you find a new company coming into Albany with this many
new jobs.
Cooper Tire Co. opened in 1991 with plans to hire more than 700 workers.
Proctor & Gamble has generated more than 166 new jobs in the past
decade, Martin said.
"The bottom line is 166 families will now have a better opportunity to
keep food on the table," Martin said, "to make a better life for
themselves in the Good Life City."
