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National Grid Metering has a busy 24 x 7 contact
centre based in Gloucester handling some 2m customer service calls
per year.
One of the companies served by the Contact Centre was OnStream,
previously a wholly owned subsidiary of National Grid created to
offer a metering service to the rapidly expanding unregulated
metering market.
"OnStream's key driver was growth and the contact centre was
instrumental in powering it. From a standing start, we helped
OnStream install over 5 million gas and electricity meters on
behalf of its clients - the national energy suppliers - within 6
years and this required robust contact management processes and
operations," explains James Cole, Contact Centre Manager, National
Grid Metering (NGM).
To initiate the installation process, end consumers received a
letter explaining that their gas and/or electricity meter needed
replacing and inviting them to book an appointment to have a new
meter installed. The consumer then contacted the Centre
either by phone or via the website - to request a date and
time.
"Although the process sounds straightforward, there are several
factors that should not be underestimated. Firstly, it takes
skilled and knowledgeable agents to get customers 'on side' and
actually agree to have their meter changed. Secondly,
achieving appropriate resourcing levels to manage the 'spike'
inbound call traffic during peak times is very difficult - if you
throw resource at it, it's very costly due to the disproportionate
variance between peak times and 'lull' periods, where effectively
you have highly unproductive agents. Last but not least, it
was vital for us to meet our service levels for critical calls -
gas escape calls and 'no gas' situations for example, as
non-achievement was linked to financial penalties," continues
James.
To help overcome these issues, NGM approached
ContactPartners.
A robust multi-channel solution
First of all, ContactPartners worked with NGM to understand
customer call patterns and service level requirements for both
critical and non-critical calls. Then, enhancements to
existing technologies and the introduction of new capabilities to
reduce peaks by leveraging offline and self-service technologies -
and which would also improve the customer experience and reduce the
overall cost to serve - were explored.
After suitable due diligence, ContactPartners optimised NGM's
Interactive Voice Recognition (IVR) by simplifying its architecture
and providing links to self-service. ContactPartners also
implemented "QueueBuster" in order to smooth peak time call traffic
- callers are simply invited to leave their contact details and
then hang up. QueueBuster then joins the queue on their
behalf and reconnects customers with a phone call once it has
reached an agent.
"ContactPartners quickly got to grips with our requirements and
helped us identify and implement enhancements to existing
capability as well as a brand new call management solution: a
powerful combination that delivered rapid and compelling return on
investment. QueueBuster significantly reduces the number of
angry customers and increases overall customer satisfaction -
customers hate hanging on the telephone, but are happy to receive a
call back without having to wait in a queue," comments James.
Rapid and compelling ROI
Within a very short timeframe, NGM realised significant
benefits:
- The customer experience was improved. A number of surveys
showed that customers readily adopted the new and improved
technologies and that this led to increased levels of customer
satisfaction. Satisfaction levels increased by over 10% and many
commented on the novel option to leave their contact details and to
avoid waiting in a queue
- Operational costs were reduced by 8%, namely by encouraging
people to self-serve, flattening out the calling spikes and by
achieving optimal staffing levels
- OnStream consistently met its target service levels with 90% of
all calls being answered within 20 seconds vs. 80% prior to the
introduction of QueueBuster. This was doubly beneficial in
that contractual and financial liabilities were avoided due to call
handling standards being achieved
- The introduction of the new 'self-service' capabilities enabled
'up' and 'downstream' process improvements within NGM, resulting in
further efficiency improvements and cost savings. One particular
example was the introduction of messaging to encourage customers to
'self serve' and book meter installation appointments via the web
portal. This reduced calls and costs in to the Centre and
importantly, enhanced customer satisfaction by providing another
option to satisfy the customer's requirements
- Employees were less stressed at peak times and more engaged
overall as they were able to use their skills and knowledge to
deliver consistently good levels of customer service
"ContactPartners helped us achieve considerable and tangible
benefits extremely quickly. The bottom line is they are
experts at making customer contact 'better' - and ultimately
professional. In terms of ContactPartners' working style, I'd
sum it up with 3 words: focused, passionate and timely," concludes
James.
On 24 October 2011, OnStream was acquired by Macquarie Group for
£274M. ContactPartners and NGM continue to collaborate
closely on various customer management initiatives.
About National Grid Metering
National Grid Metering is a subsidiary company of National Grid
and provides metering services in the regulated gas metering
market. National Grid currently owns some 15 million
domestic, industrial and commercial gas meters.
