DATE: Thursday, March 27, 1997              TAG: 9703270375

SECTION: BUSINESS                PAGE: D1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY DAVE MAYFIELD, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: HAMPTON                           LENGTH:   49 lines

BELL ATLANTIC PLANS PHONE CENTER HUNDREDS OF BACK-OFFICE JOBS TO BE CREATED AT HAMPTON FACILITY

Bell Atlantic Corp. plans to announce today that it will open a telephone customer-service and sales center in the city's Newmarket Fair Mall, adding hundreds more jobs to the growing ranks of back-office workers in Hampton Roads.

The phone company declined to provide details on its announcement, which will be made in conjunction with Gov. George F. Allen.

But sources said Bell Atlantic's center, in the mall's former Miller & Rhoads store, could employ more than 500 people.

Barbara Lephardt, chief negotiator with Bell Atlantic for the Communications Workers of America, said high-ranking company officials informed her Wednesday that the center will be operated by a new subsidiary that sells packages of telecommunications services.

She said the subsidiary, called Bell Atlantic Plus, will bundle services such as cellular and long-distance telephone, Internet access, and satellite or cable TV into a single package.

Every major telecommunications provider is pursuing such bundling strategies, figuring that many customers will prefer the simplicity of a one-stop shop over buying phone, TV and other services a la carte.

Numerous communities in the mid-Atlantic, including some in South Hampton Roads, had sought the Bell Atlantic facility. In choosing a site in the struggling Newmarket Fair, Bell Atlantic joins a growing list of back-office operators that are putting depressed former retail space to use.

Last May, West Telemarketing Corp. of Omaha, Neb., announced the opening of a center in the former Rose's department store in Hampton's Willow Oaks Shopping Center. More than 1,500 jobs are planned for that facility.

Call centers like Bell Atlantic's and West's are Hampton Roads' biggest growth industry. Dozens of such back-office facilities have opened in the region in the past decade, creating a total of more than 10,000 jobs.

The CWA's Lephardt said she wasn't provided any details on pay and benefits for the new Hampton employees. She said Bell Atlantic has decided to open the center as a non-union facility, but the union will ``most likely enter into an organizing endeavor at a later date.''

Sources in the local commercial-development sector said the site Bell Atlantic has chosen consists of about 100,000 square feet over two stories, and that there will be parking available for about 700 vehicles. They said the phone company is planning to open the facility as early as June.

MEMO: Staff writers Mylene Mangalindan and Stephanie Stoughton

contributed to this report.

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