About 150 employees of the Budget Rent A Car contact center in Wichita Falls, Texas will lose their jobs when the facility is closed down during the first quarter of 2009.

John Barrows, vice president of corporate communications for the Avis Budget Group, confirmed that the call center is being closed and that employees were notified of the decision on Dec. 2.

The Wichita Falls contact center is being integrated with centers in Tulsa and Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada.

Barrows said the transition is expected to take about four months, and he also pointed out that the shutdown is part of an overall staff reduction across the company, which was announced in Avis Budget Group’s third quarter report.

“It is not just Wichita Falls,” Barrows said. “It is a total staff reduction of more than 1,400, U.S., international, staff and field. It is part of the five-point cost reduction we announced back in November.”