MONTEGO BAY, St James - Junior Minister of Industry, Investment and Commerce, Sharon Ffolkes-Abrahams has welcomed the opening of the LIME contact centre in Montego Bay, which will create roughly 180 jobs in coming weeks.

"This is great news! We welcome the fact that this investment will result in the creation of 180 jobs, initially," an elated Folkes-Abrahams expressed during yesterday's official opening of the centre in the Montego Bay Free Zone.

The opening of the facility is a collaborative effort between LIME Jamaica and the Canadian-based telecommunications company, Telus.

Yesterday, Ffolkes Abrahams in lauding the partnership, said the collaboration between the companies will result in technological advancements, "sharing experiences and expertise that will certainly serve to complement the efforts to enhance the development of our telecommunication industry".

Chairman of the recently established Business Process Industry Association of Jamaica (BPIA) Yoni Epstein, was also excited over the investment by LIME and Telus.

" We are very thankful for this. And I think this is a step in the right direction to continue to grow the sector and grow the job, jobs, jobs. That is what it is all about," Epstein remarked.

And Gary Sinclair, VP for LIME in Jamaica and Cayman Island, said he is looking forward to a good relationship with Telus.

"Telus has the distinction of providing probably the best customer service in Canada and probably globally in the telecommunications business. We are proud to be partners with them and we are looking forward to this partnership," Sinclair stressed.

He added that the partnership will allow for an overall reduction in call waiting time, increased ability to resolve more queries the "first time, everytime,"and improved agent empowerment.

"Ultimately this partnership with Telus is going to help us increase the number of increased satisfied customers, and that is what we are striving for."

Bruce Carpenter VP of Business Development for Telus International for his part expressed that "the collaboration is expected to deliver world class services".

In the meantime, the junior minister, in whose constituency the facility has been established has hailed the 26 companies which have been responsible for the provision of 13,000 jobs in the IT sector, that has resulted in Jamaica being the "leading contact centre location in the Caribbean".

" These jobs span a wide range of BPO services in finance and accounting, human resource outsourcing (HRO), receivables management, technical help-desk support outbound sales and lead generation," she pointed out.