Pearl completes £486m BPO deal with TCS

The Pearl life assurance group has completed a £486m business process outsourcing (BPO) deal with the UK subsidiary of India's Tata Consultancy Services (TCS).

The 12-year deal was originally agreed last October. TCS has set up UK subsidiary Diligenta in order to provide processing and administration services for Peterborough-based Pearl Group.

Diligenta will employ around 950 of Pearl Group's current 1,100 staff with the remainder staying on with the closed book firm. The company said no jobs will be lost as a result of the outsourcing deal.

Over the course of the contract, Diligenta will consolidate 11 financial and administrative systems onto a single platform.

Jonathan Moss, managing director of life services at Pearl Group, said the deal will provide certainty over a major portion of the company's cost base well into the future.

He said in a statement: "This is very important protection for policyholders because over the long term the unit cost per policy will be maintained at competitive levels."