John Lewis to slash outsourced customer service staff

The John Lewis Partnership is cutting the number of outsourced workers it currently employs from customer service provider Foundever by 20%, from 1,000 workers to 800.

The move to scale back the work force provided by Foundever comes after the owner of John Lewis and Waitrose revealed its plans to cut costs as part of its turnaround strategy.

Foundever handles the majority of John Lewis’s customer service and has been its partner for the past 17 years, according to The Telegraph.

The John Lewis Partnership is further expected to take the axe to its workforce in the coming months, having overhauled its redundancy policy to slash payouts.

As reported at the end of January 2024, as many as 11,000 roles, which represents more than 10% of the partnership's 76,000-strong workforce, could also be cut.