Post on 12-Nov-2020
CUSTOMER SELF-SERVE AND OUTAGE COMMUNICATIONS: A CASE STUDY
About Hydro Ottawa
> 315,000 residential and business customers in Ottawa, Canada’s capital
> Third largest municipal-owned electrical utility in Ontario with 1100 km2 of service territory
> 90% customer satisfaction
> SAIFI and SAIDI less than 1.25
1
Norm Fraser, Chief Operating Officer
SMART METER AND AMI PROJECT > Project began in 2005 > All meters replaced by end
of 2010 > Our outsourced meter-
reading company was used to replace meters
> Technology is Elster meter and Energy Axis MAS
> Very few complaints and fewer than 0.1% refusals (now resolved)
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TIME OF USE ROLLOUT
Page 3
midnight midnight 700 1100 1700 1900
Summer weekdays
Summer weekends and holidays
Winter weekdays
Winter weekends and holidays
midnight midnight 700 1100 1700 1900
> All customers have smart meters
> Completely re-tooled our meter-to-cash processes
> Centralized MDM/R
> Hourly reads, hourly pricing
> Redesigned bill
> Enhanced disaster recovery systems
SMART METERS – METER TO CASH PROCESS
4
Meter Data Collection System
(MAS) Smart Meters
Collectors
Web Portal
Meter Data Management
System (AMI MT)
Provincial Meter Data Management
& Repository (MDM/R)
Customer Information
System (CIS)
1 2 3 4
300,000 1,200
$ Send Bill to
customer
Provides customer access to hourly data
and account information
Billing determinants
Data in 24 hr segments
Data per collector
1,520 readings per customer every 2 months
There is more electronic traffic in Ontario from electric utility billing, than from banking…
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> Customers have access to meter consumption data
> “MyHydroLink” – 34% penetration
> Customizable dashboard
AUTOMATING THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
AUTOMATING THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE > Electronic billing – 22%
penetration
> Move-in and move-out requests over the internet
> Online payment history
> Profile management
> Pre-authorized payment options
> Customized alerts for consumption, dollars spent, bill prediction, percent of peak consumption, payment reminders and collection alerts 6
> Enhanced IVR automatically links customers to specialized call centre agents based on the type of inquiry
> Automatic measurement system for customer satisfaction – 6 questions
> Credit card payments
> Remote disconnect and reconnect
> Mobile web application
> Text messaging for politicians and media
> Outage maps
AUTOMATING THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
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The biggest leap for our customer benefit was enhanced outage communications
RESULTS > Reduced average outage call duration by 83% from 3 mins to 30
seconds > Reduced the number of blocked calls (due to a busy signal) to 0.45%
> Positive customer feedback about ease of use and speed of information
> Very positive feedback on outage maps
> 34% of customers have signed up for online energy monitoring > 22% are on electronic billing > 25% of moves completed on line or automated
> 20% of customers on automated withdrawal
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LOWER CALL VOLUMES
346,349
292,800
200,000
225,000
250,000
275,000
300,000
325,000
350,000
375,000
2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012
Number of Customers
Number of Calls
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012
76% 80%85% 83% 84%
89% 86% 87% 88%
87% 87% 90% 91% 92%88% 90%
CUSTOMER SATISFACTION
78%
80%
82%
84%
86%
88%
90%
2011 Avg
Jan-12
Feb-12
Mar-12
Apr-12
May-12
Jun-12
Jul-12 Aug-12
Sep-12
Oct-12
Nov-12
Dec-12
2012 YTD
FIRST CALL RESOLUTION