Call centres are now the fastest growing employment sector in the UK, and the industry employs more than the combined number presently working in coal mining, steel and car production. A survey by market analysts Datamonitor published in January 2000 estimated that call centre employment throughout Europe would increase by 12 percent over the next three years. Datamonitor estimated that a total of 1.3m Europeans would be working in call centres by 2003. Many companies have established call centres to shift customer services away from their High Street stores into a smaller number of sites, and in the process cut costs. The companies tend to locate their centres in economically depressed areas with a surplus of cheap labour that can be employed on casual, flexible contracts.
Many companies receive government subsidies and tax breaks for doing so.
First Direct, a subsidiary of the HSBC bank, initially set up its call centre operations in Leeds, West Yorkshire. Call centre workers are among the worst paid employees in Britain, with some earning less than 60 percent of the national average wage.