Home shopping group Shop Direct has delayed plans to close one of its call centres in Newtown, Wales after talks with unions.

The company, which runs Woolworths and Littlewoods, had last month announced plans to shutter three contact centres - putting 1,500 jobs at risk - including centres in Sunderland and Burnley.

However after talks with Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers (USDAW) and local MP Lembit Opik it has extended the closing date of the Newtown centre till the end of December. 

A spokeswoman for Shop Direct said: “Shop Direct Group can confirm that the proposed closure date for the Newtown Contact Centre has been extended to the end of December 2010 to allow time to investigate further options with third parties for avoiding redundancies at Newtown.”