Mosaic Fashions pieces together helpdesk deal

Mosaic Fashions, the owner of Coast, Karen Millen, Oasis, The Shoe Studio Group and Warehouse fashion brands, has outsourced its first stage helpdesk support to Retail Assist for its 1,500 stores around the world.

The retailer has presences in mainland Europe, Rep of Ireland, the UK and the US and grew significantly after acquiring Rubicon Retail in October 2006. Mosaic group IT director John Bovill explained to silicon.com that Rubicon had an outsourced business strategy for helpdesk support, while Mosaic had an in-house team.

silicon.com Retail & Leisure

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He said: "It didn't make sense to carry on running two helpdesk models, so we decided to go with Retail Assist which already had a relationship with the group."

But the accelerated growth strategy adopted by the Mosaic made an in-house support team less viable - Bovill said the group expects to triple in size across the world in the next three years.

The service, which was rolled out in March, will support all of Mosaic's electronic point of sale systems. Bovill said the in-house support team had been reduced by half and that he expects the cost of the outsourcing project to pay for itself in less than six months.

More problematic enquiries will be forwarded to in-house support, or support from technology providers.

Bovill said: "It's more about being able to concentrate on developing new systems to support the business rather than cutting costs."