A corporate sea change is under way at credit card lender MBNA, with its 3,700 Maine employees.

On Sunday, a lengthy New York Times report disclosed that MBNA co-founder Charles Cawley of Camden retired last fall after a clash with his board and that the Wilmington, Del., company is tightening its fiscal belt.

On Tuesday, MBNA confirmed what has been whispered in the midcoast for months: Its MBNA America unit is shifting 360 jobs from Camden to offices in Belfast and Rockland, all by April 15.

The sprawling Knox Mill complex and adjacent buildings in Camden, where MBNA began operating in Maine in 1993, will be leased to retail and other businesses.

The company now ranks as the world’s second-largest credit card lender. MBNA employs 3,700 in Maine, down from a peak of 4,300 in recent years, spokesman David Spartin said Tuesday.

That level of employment is expected to remain steady, he said.

Chip Messick, who heads MBNA’s Maine operations, said Tuesday the company expects to add 200 jobs in the midcoast in coming months. MBNA is advertising employment on area radio stations.

“We’re very committed to our operations in Maine,” Spartin said, “particularly in the midcoast area.”

In addition to Belfast and Rockland, MBNA operates offices in Orono, Farmington, Fort Kent, Presque Isle, Brunswick and Portland

In all, MBNA employs 28,000, in offices in Atlanta, Cleveland, Houston, Baltimore, Wilmington, Del., and elsewhere in the United States, as well as in Canada, the United Kingdom, Spain and, most recently, Shanghai, China.

Spartin said the Camden consolidation was made to achieve a more efficient use of space, since the company has a large office campus in Belfast and a new office in Rockland. It also will allow the marketing and telephone sales departments in Camden to work alongside other departments in Belfast and Rockland.

And the move also brings “substantial savings,” Spartin said, without being specific.

“But our overall strategy has not changed,” he said.

The philanthropic work also will continue, Spartin said, through the MBNA Foundation, which awards college scholarships and grants to educators. “We will continue to be supportive of the community,” he said.

Though some call centers run by other companies have moved offices to Asia, Spartin said MBNA’s overseas expansions have been geared toward opening markets there. Two years ago, the company opened offices in Spain. The new office in China is aimed at recruiting Chinese customers.

Messick said MBNA’s offices in Maine perform well, in both sales and customer satisfaction. He was not specific.

“We have very, very strong results in Maine,” he said

MBNA’s profits have moved steadily upward since the company was formed in 1982, topping $1 billion in 1999 and $2.3 billion last year.

Building gleaming office complexes and a sprawling corporate retreat center, buying yachts and jets, transforming waterfront industrial sites into parks, gobbling up real estate, and dropping $1 million donations on area YMCAs, libraries, schools and other nonprofits have been MBNA’s signature in Maine for the past 10 years.

Spartin, repeating what was reported in the Times on Sunday, said MBNA has sold some of its yachts, jets and fine art, signaling a change in style.

But many Maine observers of the company have seen that change in style emerge for the past two years, or sometime after the stock market took a post-Sept. 11 tumble. While the company continued to hire, the big-ticket philanthropy slowed, the office expansions stopped.

Instead of buying real estate, the company actually began selling off some of its early acquisitions, such as a former motel in Lincolnville that was its first corporate retreat center.

The stock market drop sent MBNA Corp.’s value from a high of $28 per share to about $14. It has since rebounded to $28.

In October 2002, MBNA co-founder Al Lerner died, and Cawley, who oversaw the company operations and had been president, became chief executive officer. The company said an orderly succession for beyond Cawley’s tenure was planned.

Early this year, that plan was executed, with Bruce Hammonds taking over as MBNA Corp.’s president and CEO, and John Cochran named as CEO of the credit card division.

Cawley, whose family ties to the Belfast, Lincolnville and Camden areas are what brought MBNA and much of the big-ticket philanthropy to Maine, retired late last year.

Cawley, who with Lerner launched the company in 1982, spinning off a failing credit card division from Maryland Bank into a Fortune 500 company, wanted to continue to make compensation decisions, while the board wanted a compensation committee to rule.

Hammonds wanted to send a message that if belt tightening were in order, then top-level executives were going to do their part, the newspaper reported.

The Times story reported that Cawley clashed with the company’s board of directors in November over compensation for the top nine executives. The board, which had cut upper management pay two years ago by 28 percent, wanted to cut it again, the Times reported. Cawley balked.

Later that month, Cawley announced his retirement.

On Tuesday, Spartin confirmed the conflict over the pay issue.

“There’s been a sea change in corporate governance,” Spartin said, in the wake of highly publicized corporate scandals in which executives were perceived as greedy and irresponsible.

On Monday, Cawley issued a statement in response to the Times article, noting that in his 22 years with the company he was “a dedicated, responsible and ethical executive” who consistently helped MBNA deliver outstanding value to shareholders.

“I chose to retire in my mid-60s and picked a year-end as the most orderly time to do so,” Cawley said. “Most importantly, the company was doing very well and there was a clear succession plan in place.”