The leader of Newcastle City Council, Nick Forbes (left), opens Virgin Trains’ Customer Solutions Centre with Virgin’s Customer Experience Director Alison Watson and Managing Director David Horne
LONDON, 2016-Sep-22 — /Travel PR News/ — Virgin Trains has opened a new customer call centre in Newcastle, creating up to 85 new jobs in the city.
The company’s Customer Solutions Centre is designed to improve customer service by bringing roles in-house and with employees working and travelling along its east coast route.
The centre is based at Virgin Money’s Headquarters, in Gosforth, and will handle a range of customer inquiries, including bookings, special assistance, delay repay and customer feedback.
The opening was welcomed by business and civic leaders.
Newcastle City Council leader Nick Forbes said: “It is great to see Virgin further establishing itself in Newcastle, bringing more jobs and careers to our city.
“Not only does the North East have strong historical links to the railways and the East Coast Main Line, but, as these new jobs will demonstrate, the line continues to play an important role in our regional economy. Staff who know and use the line themselves will be an asset to both Virgin Trains and Newcastle and I welcome this news.”
Jonathan Walker, Head of Policy and Campaigns for the North of England Chamber of Commerce, said: “We’re delighted that Virgin Trains is making this commitment to the North East. This decision is a testament to the region’s reputation for friendliness and diligence, which makes us a natural home for high quality customer service operations.”
David Horne, Managing Director of Virgin Trains, said: “We’re really pleased to open our new Customer Solutions Centre in Newcastle and to bring around 85 jobs to the city.
“This is great news for Newcastle and the North East region. The customer is at the heart of everything we do, and so enhancing our customer service through a dedicated team, who work, live and travel on our east coast route, will ensure we provide a consistently high level of quality.
“These new skilled jobs are also very important to our business, as we prepare for a new era in rail travel on the east coast route with the introduction of 65 brand new Virgin Azuma trains in 2018.”
ENDS
About Virgin Trains:
Stagecoach and Virgin are working in partnership to operate the East Coast and West Coast inter-city routes under the Virgin Trains brand. Together, they are on track to revolutionise rail travel across the UK.
The combined network connects some of the nation’s most iconic destinations including Glasgow, Liverpool, Birmingham, Manchester, Edinburgh, Newcastle, Leeds, York and London.
Virgin Trains is committed to delivering a high speed, high frequency service, offering shorter journey times, more comfortable travel and excellent customer service. Customers consistently rate Virgin Trains as one of the top long-distance rail franchise operators in the National Rail Passenger Survey (NRPS) commissioned by industry watchdog, Transport Focus.
On the East Coast route, £140m is being invested to create a more personalised travel experience. We have already invested £21m to completely revamp our existing fleet and customers can now benefit from 42 additional services (22,000 extra seats) per week between Edinburgh and London. 2018 will see the introduction of completely new Azuma trains being built in the UK by Hitachi.
The West Coast route has a proud record of challenging the status quo – from introducing tilting Pendolino trains, to a pioneering automated delay repay scheme and becoming the first franchised rail operator to offer m-Tickets for all ticket types.
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SOURCE: Virgin Trains