Experian Expands Van Buren Facility

Experian – a Costa Mesa, Calif.-based company that offers online credit reports and analysis  – will be hiring 100 more employees over the next few months at its customer care center in Van Buren.

The center provides call support for Experian’s online credit report and monitoring services. It opened in December 2006, and since then has hired 450 workers, 80 percent of whom are from the area, said Robert Fosmire, vice president of customer care and retention for Experian.

In the nine months the center has been open, about 15 percent of the employees have been promoted to management positions.

“We promote from within primarily,” Fosmire said.

Experian built out 52,000 SF for the center in an old Wal-Mart building, installing 600 workstations.

The company relocated the Van Buren customer care center from two locations in the Philippines. The move was part of a focus on providing consumers with the best possible service. Fosmire was in charge setting up the Philippine centers four years ago, and also oversaw the move to the United States.

“It’s been great to bring [the jobs] back,” he said. “The community is fabulous and the workforce is excellent.”

Fosmire wants Experian to be one of the preferred employers in the region, adding that many of the company’s new hires have been referrals from existing employees.