Optus automates credit risk; makes 70 redundant

Optus has announced plans to make 70 Australian positions redundant through the telco's efforts to automate its credit risk management systems.

The company advised the Communication Worker’s Union (CWU) late last week that the jobs will no longer be offered from its financial unit in Adelaide.

The cuts will take place over the next few months as Optus works to implement the Adeptra risk intervention solution, in order to automate contact with customers identified as a billing risk.

The CWU said Optus should explore redeployment options for the 70 affected staff, while Optus said it had already moved 12 members of the Adelaide finance team to other areas of the business.

The news follows Optus' April announcement of a further 350 job cuts on top of the roughly 1500 workers who have been let go since 2012 as part of an ongoing company-wide restructure.

[Update 1/9/2014]: A spokeswoman for the telco has advised that the 70 Adelaide redundancies were included in this batch of job losses.

The cost of the restructure, including redundancy payments, took a $24 million chunk out of Optus’ earnings in the last full quarter.

However, overall staffing actually rose over the same period, as Optus looked to hire more retail staff to man an expansion in branded shop fronts.