Aviva to hire 3,300 in India, Lanka by 2007

Aviva, the fifth largest global insurance company, will hire around 3,300 people in India and Sri Lanka by 2007. This is part of its strategy to outsource some of its life and non-life services from the UK.

Aviva, which has a life insurance joint venture with Dabur in India, on Wednesday announced that it will hire 760 more people in India and another 190 in the Sri Lanka, taking the total headcount to 4,460 by 2005. The plan is to enhance this figure to 7,000 by 2007.

The global insurance entity has already employed 3,700 people in India and 25 in Sri Lanka. Aviva offshore service chief operating officer Sean Egan expects about 150 "compulsory redundancies" in 2005 as a result of the offshoring jobs.

The decision to expand offshoring operations in India is primarily on account of the fact that it has its life insurance operations in the country, he added.

"In the UK Aviva operates in a very competitive market where customers continually seek better value for money and quality service. The experience of our existing offshore operations shows that the service levels in India continue to match that we achieve in our UK operations," said Egan.