Quality vs. Cheap News: Offshore Outsourcing Practiced Outside Of Tech Industry, Too

April 8, 2005

So those of you who have it in your mind that�offshore outsourcing�is�strictly confined to the technology industry:

Sify, an Indian Internet services company, reported a story yesterday that U.S. employees of the global information company and international multimedia news agency, Reuters Group, "will protest the offshore outsourcing of editorial jobs as their union begins its legal challenge to the company's attempt to cover Wall Street from Bangalore."

Here's the full story.

Reuters US staff to protest outsourcing

Thursday, 07 April , 2005, 09:51

Washington: US employees of the Reuters Group will protest the offshore outsourcing of editorial jobs as their union begins its legal challenge to the company's attempt to cover Wall Street from Bangalore, the Newspaper Guild of New York said.

The Guild's charge that offshoring US-based editorial jobs violates its contract with Reuters will be heard before an independent arbitrator, whose decision is binding. The case could take months to complete.

As the lawyers square off, journalists and other employees will picket Reuters US head office quarters in Times Square and other US bureaus at lunchtime to call attention to the dispute.

"Instead of focusing on producing the highest quality news, Reuters is now focused on producing the cheapest news," said New York Guild President Barry Lipton. "This change is not just bad for our members, it's bad for Reuters and its clients." Even after the Guild alerted Reuters managers last August that the exportation of jobs violates their contract, the London-based news and information company announced plans to expand its Bangalore-based editorial staff that was set up to write about American companies and other selected US financial news, the guild said.

"This is remote-control journalism, with low-paid reporters in India writing US news to US editors' specifications," said Lipton. "It produces a cheaper product but adds no value to stories with reporting at the source." Although no Guild-covered employees have lost jobs to offshore outsourcing to date, that could change in a few weeks with the company's plans to move other US-based editorial jobs to Canada and Singapore, it said.

The exportation of New York-based reporting jobs to Bangalore comes just a few years after Reuters built its Times Square office tower and received millions of dollars in tax breaks by agreeing to retain and increase jobs in the city, the guild said.

The guild and Reuters have been in contract negotiations for more than two years, with management seeking to slash health care coverage, retirement benefits and job security.

The guild, represents more than 450 print, television and still picture journalists, technicians and other employees at Reuters' US subsidiary, Reuters America LLC.

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DRB