US Airways is hiring in 3 cities, including Phoenix

by Max Jarman - Nov. 1, 2011 02:49 PM

US Airways is hiring 150 customer service agents at its Phoenix call center as part of a deal with its union to bring customer service jobs back to the United States from overseas.

Altogether, the Tempe airline will be hiring 400 customer service agents in Phoenix, Reno, Nev., and Winston-Salem, N.C. under contract agreements with the Airline Customer Service Employee Association , CWA and IBT.

The jobs will be moving from a Philippines call center in Manila under an agreement by the airline to handle all service calls originating in the United States from U.S. call centers.

The change is effective today. starting Nov.1.

International calls will be handled by agents at a call center in Liverpool, England.

The agreement was part of a deal to combine US Airways customer service employees represented by the Communications Workers of America union and former America West Airlines workers, represented by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters. The two airlines merged in 2005.

The Airline Customer Service Employee Association -- CWA and IBT represents more than 6,000 US Airways reservations and airport customer service employees.

In a statement, US Airways Chairman and CEO Doug Parker called the addition of 400 new jobs extremely good news for the union and the three communities where the hiring will occur.

The new hires will bring the airline's U.S. customer service headcount to about 1,900 agents by the end of the year.

"Nothing speaks louder than solidarity when we all work together for a successful airline," Velvet Hawthorne, IBT/CWA Association chairperson and CWA staff representative, said in a statement.

To facilitate bringing the jobs back onshore, US Airways in July also launched a new telephone interactive voice response system to help the new agents more efficiently handle calls.

The airline handles about 18 million customer service calls per year.

For information on how to apply for the jobs, go to usairways.greatjob.net/pub/usairways/index.html.

http://www.azcentral.com/business/artic ... oenix.html