Axe falls on City link HQ

A national courier firm is to close down its Black Country headquarters, where 600 people are em-ployed, and axe jobs, bosses announced today.

City Link is to shut its Wednesbury Hub national distribution depot and merge with Coventry.

The firm today declined to say how many jobs would be lost, but said redundancies would be minimised by redeploying staff to smaller depots.

The landmark hub in Midland Road off the Black Country Route, employs around 600 people but will close this summer.

Managing director Stuart Godman said the firm had taken taken the "strategic business decision" to consolidate its two national hubs into a single base in Coventry.

He said the network would then be supported by a new regional hub structure.

"It is therefore our intention to cease the current hub operation at Wednesbury in the summer of 2010," he said.

"The company has made this decision in order to take advantage of the resulting operational efficiencies and cost benefits.

"Redundancies will be minimised by redeploying employees into roles in other City Link locations," he added.

Last year, City Link axed one fifth of its 6,500-strong national workforce following multi-million pound losses suffered since the £210m takeover of Coventry-based Target Express in 2006.

The firm also invested £2.5m in a new parcel tracking and IT system and spent a six-figure sum moving its Kidderminster depot from Hartlebury to a new base three times the size in Finepoint Way.

It currently runs 85 de-pots in the UK, including a smaller depot in Leabrook Road North, Wednesbury, as well as in Birmingham, Stafford and Kidderminster.