#1 Competition will intensify and customer experience will be the new battleground:
As the Water Industry embraces smart meters and seeks to rollout its own programmes it does raise some questions. With non-household clients able to choose and switch water suppliers since April this year, and with the prospect of domestic households following suit, it’s clear that there will be implications to customer retention and experience. Competition for business and non-household suppliers will intensify as consumers seek the best tariffs for this precious resource. To meet that you need to make sure you not only deliver the best service at the best price but you also need to deliver the best customer experience.
#2 Suppliers will need to extend their security and PCI DSS compliance measures:
In 2016 UK utility companies were ranked as the highest risk industry for data breaches[1]. With the ever increasing sophistication of hackers it’s becoming even more critical to ensure that your customers’ personal and payment card data is protected.
Payments through a water company’s contact centre may well be PCI DSS compliant – ensuring the customers’ personal and card holder data remain protected and secure – but online payments and automatic top-ups mean that these will also fall under the scope of PCI DSS compliance. Water companies will need to show that they have extended their solutions to cover these to maintain compliance and avoid the risk of a data breach. With a huge choice of payments options including Live Chat Pay, Apple Pay, Agent Assisted payments, Self Service payments and Contact Centre payments – suppliers can make sure that they are delivering outstanding customer experience that will help retain customers in a competitive world.
#3: –There will be a staggering increase in the volume of customer contact:
To book and manage these installations a whole range of customer engagement, management and scheduling will be required. So, suppliers will need to be able to scale up to handle this, making use of cost-effective channels such as Live-Chat and a complete Omni-Channel solution will mean you can engage with customers through the channels that work best for them.
#4 New and shiny equipment = more tech support:
With the fitting of smart meters and issuing of In-Home Displays (IHDs) comes the increased need to provide information and support. Customers will have a wide range of questions such as “how do I use the IHD? What happens if I spill coffee on my IHD? Can I get a second IHD for the garage? Self-Service channels are ideal for providing help and support for these routine and frequently asked questions. Using Knowledge Base content via web and apps as well as implementing technologies like Chatbots can deliver an accurate and consistent service across a large customer base and make sure that more vulnerable or less tech-savvy customers are not excluded.
#5 Interactive is the new normal:
As customers get to grips with their In-Home Displays and interact more with their supplier, they’ll also begin to expect more interactivity on suppliers’ websites and apps. If I can see my water usage while I’m stood in the kitchen, why can’t I see it while I’m waiting for the train home?
#6 Life might get harder for the ‘left behind’ customers:
In a post-2020 Britain suppliers should have a majority of their customers on Smart Meters. But there will always be a portion of homes that could not, or for whatever reason did not, have their meters replaced. As this will be the exception agents will be less familiar with the processes and so find it harder to provide good support. This is the time that contact centres will need to have a good Knowledge Base content solution to help agents to serve those customers left behind.
#7 Pre-payment becomes more compelling:
With legacy prepayment meters customers would have to manually keep an eye on how much credit they had and, if a supplier didn’t offer self-service options, customers would have to go to a shop to buy more credit. With the introduction of Smart Meters customers will easily be able to see how much credit they’ve got using their In-Home-Display (IHD) or via self-service apps or web portals. Topping up the meter will be done ‘over the air’ so customers can buy credit instantly without even needing to leave the house. This added convenience, coupled with pledges by suppliers to maintain price parity with credit customers, makes pre-payment a better product which could increase transaction volumes.
Eckoh are one of the leading providers of contact centre and secure payment solutions that deliver outstanding customer experience. As a PCI DSS Level 1 Service Provider since 2010 we have extensive experience in helping our clients achieve and maintain PCI DSS compliance and so avoid the risk of damaging data breaches. We also operate our own PCI DSS compliant contact centre and so we know the challenges you face when delivering the best customer engagement. Find out more at
www.Eckoh.com, read our Utilities case study or call 08000 630 730.
Sources: [1] Utility Week http://utilityweek.co.uk/news/dealing-with-data-breach/1253262#.WSKsKE11taQ
