EDS to Close Morrisville, N.C., Call Center.(Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News)

Mar. 25--One call center is re-opening in Raleigh with plans to hire up to 600 full- and part-time workers, even as another call center with 425 employees is set to close in Morrisville.

Xtrasource, which offers large manufacturers product customer service by phone and over the Internet, has hired 90 employees since it opened this month, but hopes to increase its work force by several hundred in the next year as its client list grows.

But Electronic Data Systems said Friday it will close by early June the customer service call center it has operated for six years in Morrisville. The Plano, Texas-based company said the closing is part of a cost-cutting program and that finding enough workers in the Triangle's tight labor market had become too difficult.

"We've got some good people in Raleigh; it's just hard to find enough of them," said Dana Bolden, spokesman for EDS.

Bolden said about 90 full-time and 120 part-time workers will lose their jobs. The company hopes to shift some of the remaining employees to other EDS offices in the Triangle.

Workers will receive a severance package, as well as a bonus nearly equal to an extra paycheck if they stay until the closing of the call center.

One of the Triangle's largest technology employers, EDS has 1,800 workers in the Triangle. Most of those jobs are in the management of computers, networks and other information systems for clients.

The company, which leases a 30,000-square-foot office for its call center in Morrisville's Southport Business Park, began discussing the future of the call center two weeks ago. EDS closed its call center in Charlotte on March 2, throwing 350 people out of work.

Xtrasource is operating from a 21,000-square-foot office on Trust Drive, north of Spring Forest Road, and hopes to expand into another 10,000-square-feet in the same building.

Paul Tyler, vice president of customer service and telecommunications for Xtrasource, said his company had been looking for a location in the Southeast when it bought Customer Access Resources, which had operated a call center in the same North Raleigh location. Customer Access closed its 120-employee office last month before it was acquired by Xtrasource.

Tyler said he is confident that the Triangle's concentration of universities will provide a ready pool of part-time workers.

"We like to be near campuses," he said. "You can have college students who will come in and work 10 to 12 hours in a week to cover your schedule." Tyler acknowledged that the Triangle's labor market is tight, but said that the company was prepared to find and keep workers.

"It's the same all around the country," he said. "We offer incentives to hold onto workers."

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