Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, March 6, 1993 TAG: 9303060081
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: A-4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GEORGE KEGLEY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
ALLSTATE MOVES JOBS TO ROANOKE COUNTY
Allstate Insurance Cos. is adding about 210 employees at its regional-operations center in Roanoke County, part of a three-year plan to transfer work from its other centers.The company is shifting work from centers at Skokie, Ill., and Long Island, N.Y., because the Roanoke County work force is more efficient, less expensive and has less turnover, regional Vice President David Sangston, said Friday.
The number of workers transferring is small, so most hiring is being done locally, Sangston said.
The work force is expected to grow to 950 by the end of 1994, from 740 when the transfers began in early 1992. It is tied to a major renovation of the company's 160,000-square-foot building on Electric Road, he said.
The renovation will cost more than $6 million, according to an estimate from J.M. Turner & Co., the project's contractor.
The renovation of the entire interior of the building is taking 18 months or longer because Allstate workers must move to continue their work. Completion is expected by fall. Among the improvements are the installation of new lighting and raising the floors to run fiber optic cables for communications within the building.
The center has 820 employees now and another 130 will be added gradually, Sangston said. Among them were some former Dominion Bank data entry personnel, whose jobs were lost in acquisition of Dominion by First Union Corp.
One Dominion Bank unit and its manager came in for interviews, and four were hired, he said. "They're a good source and I hope we can absorb more, but we don't have a ton of openings," Sangston said.
Allstate had 13 operations centers "and we didn't need that many," so the location at Skokie was closed and work from a Tampa, Fla., center will be moved to Jackson, Miss.
The company is moving to Roanoke County such processing as issuing and renewing policies and handling auto and property insurance from other centers "in a desire to achieve savings and pass them on to customers," Sangston said. "We're fortunate to pick up these functions and add to our work force."
Some training has been provided but the quality of new hires in Roanoke is very good," he said.
The Roanoke County center is approaching its former record employment level of 850. In 1991, the center hit a low of 740 workers when accounting and data processing jobs were shifted to Hudson, Ohio.