Utility Week

28 | 7TH - 13TH FEBRUARY 2020 | UTILITY WEEK Customers "Customers want freedom" Shub Naha, business development director for utilities at Content Guru, o ers his takeaways from both the Utility Week Customer Summit and a private speakers' dinner that bridged the energy and water days of the event. I t's very clear that, thanks to the emer- gence of incredibly convenient services from companies such as Net ix, Airbnb Comment Shub Naha Business development director for utilities, Content Guru Event Utility Week Customer Summit 2020, Birmingham to deliver end-to-end issue resolution for customers. This means keeping all customer records in a single repository and giving sta• the authority to • x issues without the need to make endless data requests of colleagues in di• erent organisational silos or pass custom- ers from pillar to post. The result is high • rst- time resolution of issues and a reputation for attentive, one-to-one service. What's more, as the company grows – it took on Co-op Energy's customers and employee base in 2019 and has recently acquired Engie's energy retail business – the approach seems to be scaling up well. Whether this approach would deliver the same results for all utilities is a moot point. But what is certain is that companies across the energy and water sectors need to think hard about whether their legacy approaches to managing customer contacts and deploy- ing service technology will give them the relationships, reputation and engagement they need for the future. As urgency builds around the decarboni- sation agenda and awareness grows – albeit at a frustratingly slow pace – around the seriousness of the UK's water scarcity threat, utilities need to be con• dent that they can have e‰ cient and productive interactions with customers, both on a proactive and reactive basis. Without this, they will never gain the cur- rency they need with consumers to begin in uencing behaviours and shiŠ ing demand. And without that, decarbonisation and the creation of sustainable, service-led business models will stall. Jane Gray, content director, Utility Week types of collaborations, service experience remains the key di• erentiator in the sector. As such, utilities organisations are under constant scrutiny and regulatory pressure to provide excellent customer experiences, and the increasing expectation to protect vulnerable customers only adds to this. Customers expect the freedom to engage with providers however and whenever they wish, and to move seamlessly between di• erent channels, such as social media, webchat and phone, particularly in moments that matter such as during a loss of supply. It's important that utility organisations have the right solutions in place to gain a clear picture of the customer journey, irrespective of channels, ensuring that it can provide best-in-class customer engagement and experience." and Deliveroo, today's customers expect more from all companies — including those supplying utilities. They want to personalise their user experience, and for utility provid- ers to intuitively understand their needs. While the combination of new connected digital technologies coupled with the requirement for the industry to leverage more from existing assets is driving new continued from previous page Future of SIM consultation 2016 PR19 methodology 2017 C-MeX and D- MeX working groups Pilot year 2018-19 Shadow year 2019-20 PR19 final determinations December 2019 C-MeX and D- MeX in effect from 1 April 2020 SPEAKER FOCUS HOW ENERGY AND WATER COMPANIES COMPARE WITH THE UK AVERAGE MEASURING SUCCESS The Institute of Customer Service's Brian Weston presented insights from the latest UK Customer Satisfaction Index. Once again, utilities fell behind the pack for performance across most metrics. Ofwat director Anita Payne explained the thinking that went into the design of C-MeX and D-MeX, the water regulator's new measures for customer satisfaction. Among other changes to the old SIM mechanism, the new approach takes equal account of the experiences of customers who have contacted their water company, and those who have not. To be successful we said C-MeX and D-MeX should: • encourage companies to improve customer experiences and innovate; • be simple and meaningful for companies and customers; • be proportionate; • be practical to implement; • measure performance across companies consistently, reliably and fairly; and • refl ect customer behaviour changes and market changes. Measure UK average Energy Water Energy gap Water gap to UK average to UK average UKCSI 76.9 71.2 73.8 - 5.7 - 3.1 Product/service reliability 7.9 7.7 7.8 - 0.2 - 0.1 Easy to contact the right person to help 7.6 7.0 7.4 - 0.6 - 0.2 Staff competence 7.9 7.3 7.6 - 0.6 - 0.3 Complaint handling 5.8 5.2 5.9 - 0.6 + 0.1 Trust 7.6 6.9 7.3 - 0.7 - 0.3 Right fi rst time 80.6% 73.6% 74.5% - 7% - 6.1% Ease of using the website 7.8 7.5 7.6 - 0.3 - 0.2 % website experiences 26.4% 43.5% 37.3% + 17.1% + 10.9% "

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