Apple Considers, Drops Colorado Call Center

by , 7:45 AM EDT, October 9th, 2008

Some 500 workers hired by a recruiting company for Apple are job hunting again now that an alleged support call center in Colorado Springs, Colorado, has been cancelled. Apparently Volt Information Sciences recruited the workers to staff a support center to field iPhone and iPod questions, then just prior to training told everyone the project had been cancelled, according to The Gazette.

Apple has not confirmed that it was planning on opening a call center in the city, but Volt recruiters were telling prospective employees that the Mac and iPod maker was doing just that under a project dubbed the "Appleflex Project." The recruits were later told that via email that their training dates had been pushed back in a message that stated "today, we received notice from Apple that the iPhone Training Class you were hired for has been pushed back from Sep. 29 to Monday, Oct. 13. Unfortunately the site will not be ready until that time."

A follow up email from October 2nd added "the Volt Colorado Springs Call Center project you were hired for has been cancelled. The project was cancelled due to Economic conditions and improved quality of the product resulting in a reduced volume to the Support lines."

The call center was supposedly going to ramp up to 850 employees, which would have been a good news for the city and job seekers displaced by tech jobs that have been leaving the area. Intel closed its Colorado Springs-based chip plant earlier this year and HP has begun relocating its Colorado Springs support center, leaving over 1,000 locals out of work.

Volt has not commented on the Apple call center, leaving some to wonder if the company prematurely hired staff for Apple before a decision to move forward with the project had been finalized.