Cutting nearly 20% of Charlotte workers, Charter says workers could relocate, keep jobs

Charter Communications, the new parent of Time Warner Cable, will lay off 258 employees at its Charlotte location starting this November, according to a notice filed to the state Commerce Department.

The 258 layoffs at Charter Communications will begin on Nov. 1 and be completed by the end of June next year.

The affected employees were notified of their termination on Sept. 12.

In a statement provided to WRAL TechWire, Charter said the affected employees were offered the opportunity to transfer to another location and keep their jobs.

“Charlotte remains a key corporate location for Charter and will maintain a large local staff to manage and operate our cable system in the Carolinas,” a Charter spokesperson said via email.

“The affected employees were are offered the opportunity to stay with the company and relocate to locations where there work was performed at Charter. Charter will still be a net hire as a result of our merger with Time Warner Cable and acquisition of Bright House Networks.

“We plan to add 20,000 jobs, as a result of bringing Time Warner Cable Call Centers work back from overseas, insourcing other work and growing to meet our customer demands. “

The position with the largest number of layoffs are senior accountants, with 70 scheduled to be laid off. Other layoffs include 11 financial auditors, 18 accounting managers, and five vice presidents of finance. None of the workers are represented by a union.

Its operations located at three buildings on Crescent Executive Drive in Charlotte currently have 1,367 employees.

Charter Communications, with subsidiaries such as Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks, is the fourth largest cable operator in the United States.

The company is in the beginning stages of combining Charter, Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks under the name Spectrum. It closed on its $55 billion acquisition of Time Warner Cable in May.

[TWC has a major presence in the Research Triangle area as well.]

This notice was filed pursuant to the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act, which must be filed 60 days in advance of a plant closing that affects more than 50 employees in a 30-day period or a mass layoff of at least 500 employees or between 50 to 499 employees if they make up at least one-third of the employer’s workforce.

All North Carolina filings under the WARN Act can be found at: http://www.nccommerce.com/workforce/businesses/warn-information/warn-reports

Note: This story is from the North Carolina Business News Wire, a service of UNC-Chapel Hill’s School of Media and Journalism