Nearly 800 Layoffs Slated At Two Austin Job Sites

AUSTIN, TX — A pair of companies operating facilities in Austin have alerted to nearly 800 layoffs between them — with at least one round of furloughs blamed on corrosive economic effects of the coronavirus — as outlined in documents filed with state regulators.

Officials at Alorica, a California-based company providing outsourced customer service operations, alerted the Texas Workforce Commission of plans to permanently close its entire Austin site located at 7401 E. Ben White Blvd. by Dec. 31 — a move that will result in 712 job cuts. Patch requested correspondence sent to regulators in compliance with the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act, a federal labor law compelling companies with at least 100 workers to provide a 60-day advance notice of plant closings and layoffs.

In the correspondence, a vice president of the company said the affected workers are not represented by a union. So-called "bumping rights," whereby affected with seniority would be able to take a lower position from a co-worker to prevent being terminated do not exist given the closure of the entire operations in Austin, the VP explained.

Bumping rights do not exist, and employees are not unionized. Affected employees were notified on the same date as this letter of the Plant Closing and their respective termination dates. The chief local elected official was also notified on the date of this letter.

Patch reached out to the company to gauge if the layoffs at Alorica were due coronavirus-spurred effects. "No it’s not related to COVID," Sunny Yu said in an emailed response. "Client has made a change in suppliers and this new supplier will assume responsibility for the site’s local operations as of 1/1/21. All current employees will have the opportunity to apply for employment with the new supplier as part of the transition."

A second company named Sodexo — self-described on its website as a French food services and facilities management company headquartered in the Paris suburb of Issy-les-Moulineaux — also alerted to layoffs. In correspondence to the Texas Workforce Commission, the company blamed the economic impact spurred by the pandemic as the reason for imminent layoffs of 80 local workers.

"At this time, employees are being placed on, or have been placed on, temporary lay-off status, with only a few permanent separations associated with this crisis and business impact," a human resources official with the company wrote to state regulators. The company lists its operations as being housed at the University of Texas at Austin, 1701 Red River St.

The latest list of companies alerting to layoffs shows that Sodexo also plans to cut 177 jobs in El Paso, Texas.