Insurance Brief: SafeAuto Lays Off Call Center Workers

Posted & filed under Car Insurance, economy, Insurance Briefs.

Insurance company SafeAuto has reduced its workforce by a total of 47 this week, including eight people in Columbus, OH, citing as a cause the sour economy forcing consumers to limit or drop their insurance coverage in order to save money. They also said that the layoffs reflect a greater number of insurance shoppers using the Internet to purchase their car insurance.

The Columbus-based SafeAuto said that most of the laid-off workers were call-center personnel, and that the reductions were made over the past few weeks, and are a result of fewer customer calls being received.

Twelve employees were laid off in the Woodsfield, OH location, while the other twenty-seven layoffs took place in Hemingway, SC and Somerset, KY.

According to April Miller, SafeAuto’s senior vice president of human resources, “We evaluated expenses across each department in the company while focusing primarily on staff, which is the largest expense. Several departments within SafeAuto have chosen not to fill current vacancies, while others have increased staff.”

The company, which is known for selling state-required minimum insurance coverage to drivers in 14 states, has about 1,000 employees over all, about 694 of whom are based in Ohio.