Transactis said last week it had accepted an offer from RR Donnelley for its Document Services, Reprographics and Procurement businesses.
However, the US-based print and BPO giant claimed on Tuesday (25 January) that it had in fact been awarded a "multimillion dollar, multi-year contract" by Shop Direct Group (SDG).
SDG, which was formed through the merger of Shop Direct and Littlewoods, is a sister company of Transactis under the holding company March UK.
Transactis, formerly CDMS, was previously the in-house print and mail division of Littlewoods, which has been the main customer of the Liverpool site since its inception in 2003.
SDG's decision to award its pre-media, print management, transactional print, fulfilment and inbound document processing contract to RR Donnelley has led to the TUPE transfer of 254 staff at Transactis's Whiston production site.
Consultations began last Friday (21 January) after which Unite warned that RR Donnelley's acquisition of the company's production businesses would lead to "wide-scale redundancies". Another consultation is taking place today.
In a TUPE letter dated 21 January 2011 sent from RR Donnelley to a member of Transactis staff, the company outlined its proposed plans as a result of the transfer.
It proposed that the document services division would be delivered from the RR Donnelley shared services facilities with IT processing and document composition supported from Holmes Chapel and manufacture of critical mailings and promotional and direct marketing output delivered from Gateshead and Tewkesbury.
It said: "If implemented, these proposals are likely to result in redundancies for anyone who works within or directly supports this area."
Alison Jones, Unite regional officer, said that this division was where the largest percentage of staff were based.
The letter also outlined proposals that inbound activities will move to RRD Bolton after approximately three months from date of transfer.
Production services will relocate to Speke "resulting in a headcount reduction after approximately three months from the transfer date".
It is also proposed that the reprographic services will be restructured to include new role creation, potential change in working hours and an overall headcount reduction, followed by a proposed relocation to Speke.
The letter added: "This proposal is based on the bid made by Transactis and the proposed changes are based on economical, technical and organisational reasons with RR Donnelley intending to achieve the appropriate cost savings through their technical and organisational solutions."
Unite's Jones said that if the transfer did go ahead, it would potentially lead to the redundancies of the majority of staff.
She said: "Following the initial announcement by Transactis on 13 January, there has been a great deal of concern surrounding the proposed transfer of various departments to RR Donnelley.
"We received confirmation on Friday that the measures connected to the transfer would indeed lead to wide-scale redundancies from the highly skilled, loyal and dedicated workforce, which is devastating news.
"The employees at Transactis, through their hard work and commitment, have helped the company to win valuable contracts which, ironically, should have secured their future."
RR Donnelley declined to comment.
