Casino workers to get call-center jobs
ATLANTIC CITY - Former casino workers in this economically battered city will be among the first batch of workers to staff the new Atlantic City Contact Center.
ATLANTIC CITY - Former casino workers in this economically battered city will be among the first batch of workers to staff the new Atlantic City Contact Center.
Apparently, dealing with a gambling clientele that may or may not have won money is good training for telemarketing, where workers will be dealing with people who may or may not want their product.
And perhaps there was no better experience for those tough calls than at Revel, said Deborah Shurig, 57, who worked at the defunct casino in customer service and sales. "I dealt with unhappy customers many times," she said. "I don't miss Revel."
The Contact Center, opening next week in new offices built into the Claridge Hotel parking garage, will be staffed with 330 customer service agents by 2016. The company hopes to create 1,000 jobs by 2018.
It is operated by Netcast BPO Services, a Nevada-based, family-run company that has operated call centers in the United States and the Philippines. Officials said they were happy to be back in the U.S. and believed customers would be well-served by Atlantic City's ex-casino workers.
It was this large base of "employable yet unemployed customer-management workers" that lured the company to Atlantic City, said Fred Shadding, senior vice president of business development and himself a former exmployee of the old Sands Atlantic City, which closed in 2006.
"They have the skill set and they're hungry," said Mark Golden, son of the founder, who will be manager of the center. He said the new workers were put through extensive training - known fondly as "the torture chamber" - during which they practiced how to deal with tough customers on the other end of the line.
The company is receiving $3.27 million a year in tax credits through the Grow New Jersey Assistance Program, but company officials said that was just "gravy" in their decision to locate in Atlantic City.
The workers initially will be "outward sales specialists" for products including a medical-alert-type device, he said. The company says it will soon hire customer-service workers to receive calls for catalog companies, utilities, and travel and hospitality firms.
The jobs are full time, though the company is also looking to hire college students to work part time. The initial jobs pay between $12.50 and $13 an hour with incentives, Golden said.
The newly hired - with backgrounds in customer service, front desk, and call centers at Harrah's, Borgata, Revel, and Tropicana - said they were thrilled to be in a professional work environment. The company held an elaborate ribbon-cutting Wednesday for its 7,859-square-foot space on two floors of the Claridge.
It was a sign of the city's distressed job picture - 8,000 casino jobs lost in the last two years from four closed casinos - that an announcement of a few hundred jobs was so enthusiastically heralded.
"Let's give Atlantic City a chance," company founder Warren Golden said. "They really need a boost."
The company has hired 25 people so far, with another 25 coming on board in two weeks. About 40 percent of the people hired so far are Atlantic City residents.
Avery Jefferson, 23, of Absecon, was a front desk clerk at Golden Nugget. David Banks and Raysa Pelaez both worked in the call center at Harrah's until it was relocated to Las Vegas. They will reunite at the Contact Center.
"We would sell expensive suites," said Pelaez, 57. She said she was thrilled to be working in a non-casino job.
"I do work hard for the company," she said. "There was no appreciation. At the casino, you were just a number. I feel very excited. I was waiting for two months for the call."
While the cliché of the call center locates it somewhere near Bangalore, India, Shadding said five million people work in call-center jobs in the United States, 5 percent of them in the Northeast.
Golden said companies are interested in having call centers they can visit to "physically see how the center handles calls."
Julie Santana, 33, of Atlantic City, said she worked in reservations at Revel until it shut down just over a year ago. "We're all happy," she said. "It's been a long time looking. The pay is nice."
Paula Avear, 35, was a promotions specialist at Revel, and Chidi Emetamjo, 33, was an online banking specialist with Capitol One.
Lillian DeVane, 26, of Pleasantville, is a former debt collector who also worked at Borgata. "I'm excited to be here at the start," she said. She said she hoped to work her way up to supervisor, called "Personal Performance Driver" at the company. "It's a glimmer of hope."
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