I must respond to the letter from Mrs D Mitchell (Have Your Say, April 28), who stated the following: “Outsourcing generally means giving work to those willing to do it for less money because the worker is less qualified.”

I consider that Mrs Mitchell’s summary of outsourcing is fundamentally incorrect and misleading.

Outsourcing can result in reduced overheads and increased profit for the organisation completing the exercise.

It is viable when an organisation lacks the personnel, knowledge, experience and/or technology to complete an exercise as cost-effectively as an outside company which specialises in that particular area.

Outsourcing can apply to individual types or groups of components for manufacturing organisations, or to key services such as marketing, design, sales, IT, aftersales servicing etc – in other words, using a specialist company to provide a professional service, cost effectively.

The important factor with the proposals being considered by the council is ensuring that, where departments are outsourced, existing jobs in those areas are redundant, or internal overheads and costs will remain.

Roger Papp, MCIPS, West Way, Bournemouth