In a major coup for IDA Ireland, the US medical claims processing group, Oxford Health Plans, is to create 500 new tele-service jobs in Mullingar, Co Westmeath.
The jobs, which will come on stream over three years, will be the first in this sector to be located outside of a main urban centre and will be announced by the Tanaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Ms Harney on Monday. Most of the jobs will be in the data processing area.
Oxford Health Plans is a leading international claims specialist and provides health benefit plans to 1.9 million members in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Connecticut and New Hampshire.
The company has been in negotiations with IDA Ireland for some time about setting up a claims processing operation in the Republic, its first venture outside of the US. Building work has already begun on a new office to accommodate the company in Mullingar. A recruitment process is also underway, with jobs expected to be targeted at a mixture of people, including those with Leaving Certificate qualifications and graduates; some are expected to begin working for Oxford before Christmas.
The announcement is the second tele-based project in as many weeks. On Tuesday, the British customer management company, the Merchants Group, said it was setting up a new call centre in Cork that could create 600 jobs. Merchants Group is one of the leading tele-marketing and call centre consultants in Britain. Merchants will be seeking to recruit people with language skills, particularly French, German, Spanish and Italian. It expects to be fully operational next March.
Oxford's decision to base its operation in Mullingar is a major breakthrough for the State's job creation agencies, which have been criticised for failing to secure job projects for towns outside of the main cities. IDA Ireland will be hoping that Oxford's decision will have a knockon effect and encourage others to consider less central locations.
The State agency is understood to be currently in negotiations with a number of other potential companies in the burgeoning tele-services sector.
Oxford is based in Connecticut and is quoted on New York's Nasdaq market. Last year, it reported after-tax profits of $99 million (£65.8 million) on turnover of $3 billion, compared with $52 million in the previous year. Its sales have grown very rapidly over the past five years, expanding on average by 111 per cent.
It has two centres in the US, employing 1,000 people, which input medical claims on to an automated system where they are independently assessed to determine their eligibility. A number of prestigious multinational companies have already set up customer call centres and other tele-service projects including computer groups like Dell, Digital, Oracle 2000, Compaq and IBM. Service companies such as American Airlines, Hertz, UPS, Best Western Hotels, AOL Bertelsman and Ryanair, have also set up centres, mainly in the greater Dublin area.
Many of these companies specifically require employees with language skills, using their Irish base as a central point to handle international bookings and back-up services. IDA Ireland has been particularly focused on attracting tele-services projects to the Republic in recent years and has come under fierce competitive pressures from other States such as the Netherlands.
So far, some 43 projects, generating more than 4,000 jobs have now been established in Ireland, exceeding IDA Ireland's own target by around 1,500. It has been estimated that the sector has the potential to employ at least 5,000 people by the end of the decade.
