http://www.sun-sentinel.com/services/ne ... 2475.story

Legislators question India call center for food stamps
By Tamara Lush | The Associated Press
April 17, 2009
MIAMI - Florida legislators on Thursday questioned why customer call centers in India are handling questions from food stamp recipients who use a debit-like card to buy groceries.

State Sen. Ronda Storms, R-Valrico, requested an investigation into why the calls were being outsourced.

Department of Children & Families spokeswoman Judi Spann said the state paid JPMorgan Chase & Co. to handle a range of services for the Electronic Benefit Transfer program, including customer service and administration of the so-called EBT card.

Calls about food stamp applications are handled in Florida, but questions after a person receives the card are handled at four call centers, two in the United States and two in India. Legislators said the call center jobs should be handled by people in Florida, or at least by centers in the United States.

"I'm concerned that at the end of the day we're using taxpayer money to use a call center outside of Florida, outside of the United States," said State Rep. Julio Robaina, R- Miami. "Our money needs to stay within our state and within our country."

Florida isn't the only state to use JPMorgan to handle its food stamp benefits administration; Spann said JPMorgan uses a Tampa-based center to run food stamp programs for a total of 28 states.

JPMorgan didn't return an e-mail seeking comment about the call centers.

In 2004, legislators called for scrutiny of contracts with food stamp services that hire foreign firms after it was revealed that the Department of Children & Families hired Citicorp Electronic Financial Services at a cost of $14 million a year to replace paper food stamps with the electronic benefit cards.

As part of the contract, Citicorp outsourced some calls to India.

In 2004, JPMorgan bought Citicorp Electronic Financial Services and took over the contract.