Lloyds TSB have made a splash in the UK headlines this week. That said, you are probably thinking, what bank hasn’t been in the media recently? However, Lloyds are ruffling feathers for an entirely different reason to the economic doom bank stories of late. The Daily Mail has reported that the bank has been using foreign contractors, namely from India, to replace British IT workers. This has not been confirmed by Lloyds but what has been confirmed is that current IT workers have been told they must take a 15 percent pay cut. ComputerWeekly.com has also reported that the Lloyds Banking Group has cut an extra 2,100 jobs with the worker’s union calling for the bank to stop offshoring jobs. It sounds like Lloyds are in desperate need of some damage control PR.

So it seems the British press is not overly comfortable about the high profile outsourcing contracts recently being undertaken. In reply the bank announced its decision “…not to offshore any further permanent existing operational roles, therefore keeping roles in the UK whenever possible."

Lloyds, you may not be offshoring at the moment, but I can think of just a few companies who are. Some interesting deals have hit the virtual sourcingfocus.com press this week.

Affiliated Computer Services (ACS) has announced that it will supply an intelligent ticketing system for the first tram system in the Persian Gulf region. This marks the company’s first major contract in the Gulf and follows ACS’ new Dubai offices.

Another contract that is going ahead this year is between the BT Group and Tata Communications Ltd. The two world’s largest providers of voice and IP services have signed a voice services agreement as part of a global supply arrangement.

Through the five-year agreement, Tata Communications will become BT’s primary supplier of International Direct Dial (IDD) and other voice termination services outside BT’s own footprint countries and BT will become Tata Communication’s main distribution channel for its IDD traffic into the UK, eventually expanding into other markets across Europe.

The Round-Up will have to be especially on the ball this up coming week on all news outsourced related. It will be interesting to see how outsourcing contracts are being perceived in the media following the publicity Lloyds has received. Good press or bad press, it’s never a dull moment in the world of outsourcing.

Join me next week to find out what news the Round-Up has managed to stumble across. Let’s hope things look brighter for offshoring too.