back to article O2 chops away at middle-aged spread

Around 5 per cent of O2's UK workforce is to go, as the company rationalises its management structure in the hope of becoming more customer-focused. Quite where the operator has hitherto been focused we're not sure – on the shareholders perhaps – but now it is apparently going to target customers by getting rid of a few …

COMMENTS

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  1. JimC
    FAIL

    @Customer Focussed

    As soon as you see that buzz word you know you're dealing with a management that knows its stuffed up somehow but hasn't got a clue why or how. After all the phrase is essentially meaningless: when have you ever heard of an organisation saying that "we've been excessively customer focussed and need to redress the balance"

  2. Chris Miller

    "where the operator has hitherto been focused"

    Maximising management bonuses, just like every other company. And you can bet your boots that's exactly where the focus remains.

    You can't (entirely) blame the management - who can honestly say they'd refuse a seven-figure bonus if it were offered? You can, however, blame the people who set the bonus structure around ludicrously short-term targets. The problem is that those people (non-execs and fund managers) are on exactly the same gravy train.

  3. Richard Porter
    Gates Horns

    Why shops anyway?

    The fact that every network runs its own shops must mean there is far too much profit on mobile phones and contracts. Mobiles are now just consumer goods and should be sold by supermarkets, department, catalogue, electrical and electronics stores.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      WTF?

      Interesting High Street

      Supermarkets sell Phones, Books, Meat, Clothes, Electronics, Music...

      So goodbye to bookshops, butchers, clothes retailers etc. etc.

      If I have a problem with my iPhone, I go to Apple, not O2 as it's not normally network related...

      The high street has been hit hard enough, use it or lose it to a series of expensive coffee shops and fast food retailers.

  4. Nick Kew

    Customer focus?

    Speaking as a customer since sometime before the business was ever called O2, I've found them to be one of relatively few big businesses to be not just contactable, but also friendly and helpful when I do contact them. I think that's why I'm still a customer.

    I hope their existing customer focus isn't about to be swept away!

  5. MGJ
    FAIL

    Focus?

    Hmmm, well they have no signal penetration where I live, (ie in my house) but would not allow me to leave before my contract was up. When I asked for a PAC at the end of 18 months, I was told it would come by SMS as that was the only way they were allowed to do it; strangely when I phoned to complain that the PAC hadnt arrived 65 hours later, they gave me it over the phone. Quite happy to send me the customer survey questions by txt before they actually carried out the work too.

    Twonks.

  6. Richard 33
    FAIL

    Not more spam txts please

    Their current focus seems to be on sending irrelevant txt messages and absolutely refusing to obey the "STOP" order.

    I guess the new "customer" focus will be more of the same.

    Luckily my contract runs out in a month.

    1. Nick Kew

      Indeedie

      I used to get those. Not a huge number, but enough to be mildly annoying.

      I asked them to stop. They stopped.

      Now if only I could do that with 08** call centres ....

  7. Francis Fish
    Unhappy

    Maybe they need to invest too?

    In training their staff to know what is is they're selling.

    Switched to T-Mob after very poor customer experience where they had to keep ringing someone else to tell me about using my Andriod as a Mifi, whether they would "allow" me. Sod that, went to a store where the guys knew what they were selling.

  8. EddieD

    Very necessary...

    There are 2 o2 shops on Princes Street (i.e. within a lot less than 1 km of each other, a further shop in the St James Center, less than 1km away from either of the two on Princes Street, and none of them ever look particularly busy. And then there's Carphone Warehouse (x2) and Phones4U (x2).

    It definitely reminds me of the late 80s-mid 90s when every other shop was a PCwarehouse/Ye olde Byte Shoppe/whatever - there has to be a rationalisation of such things.

    We still need a couple - so I can eyeball them in person, before ordering online, more cheaply...

  9. Is it me?

    Earth to O2

    Apart from having two shops in the Bluewater Shopping Centre, it would actually be nice, if you are going to have shops, that they can actually do any O2 transaction, not just flog you a new phone.

    To me O2 is the devil I know, so far as I can tell the others are just as bad, or worse, and it's more hassle to shop around and chop and change than stay where you are, in fact I've had my mobile phone longer than I was married, a bit like banks really. (07802) man and boy.

  10. Andy 97

    Just wait for the same announcements from the other large telcos

    And if you think about it, adding shareholder value is what it's all about.

    The infrastructure is up and running, punters are tied-into stupidly long contracts.

    How can we add more to the balance sheets? Let's chop some staff or outsource them to somewhere cheaper.

    Hardly particle physics is it.

  11. Mat Child

    At the end of the day...

    A company's main purpose is to make money for it's owners, regardless of what business it's in.

    o2, like all the rest are out to get more for less. Other companies have a product they can tinker with, Mars Bars are lighter than they used to be, Kit Kats seem to have far less chocolate on their bottoms than they used to.

    I once replaced a car with a newer one of the same model, supposedly higher spec, but things in the older car had been replaced. (soft touch plastics replaced by hard ones, grab handles replaced by blanking plugs, etc)

    All making tiny savings per item but when you add them all up it'll be a substantial amount.

    o2 can't exactly give you 59 seconds for your minutes airtime, so they cut costs by reducing staff.

    I'm currently an o2 customer and have had little need to contact them, same goes for when i was with vodafone & T-mobile. Only switch because of flashy offers of freebies at the time (i know i'm a tart). Let's hope i don't need to talk to them any time soon.

  12. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    It's been a long downwards slope

    Cellnet as was bought the DX Communications retail outlets while I worked there. A great business with good staff moral. Quelle Surprise it went downhill from there. Like the rest of BT.

    I generally use CPW now as I won't accept "locked" phones.

  13. Tigra 07
    FAIL

    Not really gurus tho are they?

    For "gurus" their staff are really thick.

    I'm sick of waiting in their massive cues just to be told that they don't have what i want, they don't know how to do that, they don't understand, or to just recommend something completely unrelated.

    I asked if they had Liveview for Android last time and the so called "guru" tried to show me an iphone.

    Well done 02, you've created more expensive corner shops.

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