Tuesday, May 29, 2012
Kiss your financial secrets goodbye—major US banks outsource call centers to the Philippines
by Larry Geller
In March, undercover reporters for England's Sunday Times met in India with "IT consultants" who claimed they were call center workers and offered to sell them credit card and medical information for 500,000 Britons—including account holders at major banks such as HSBC.
[Mother Jones, 3 Years After Taxpayer Bailout, Bank of America Ships Jobs Overseas, 5/29/2012]
The issue at hand is the outsourcing of call centers by the major US banks. Bank of America is just the latest to become a “job creator” in Manila:
America's second-largest bank is relocating its business-support operations to the Philippines, according to a high-ranking Filipino government official recently quoted in the Filipino press. The move, which includes a portion of the bank's customer service unit, comes less than three years after Bank of America received a $45 billion federal bailout.
The Philippines government proposes a new law to "protect the integrity and confidentiality of any personal information collected from their clients… .” Some good that will do. The article notes that the average annual income for a family in the Philippines is $4,700. Law or no law, offered a quick buck, your data is for sale.
The remedy?
Move your money to your local, friendly, full-service credit union.
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