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UtilitY WEEK | 11th - 17th April 2014 | 9 Research What is driving such high expectations of customer centricity improvement in 2014/15? We asked respondents to rank key drivers. Overwhelmingly, utilities said they were driven by doing the right thing for the business and the customer far more than by external stakeholders, including govern- ment, regulators and investors. In terms of upcoming or continuing mar- ket or regulatory events that provide oppor- tunities for changing customer centricity levels, mobile technology was considered the most important, followed by the service incentive mechanism (SIM) in the water sector, and smart meters (predominantly energy). All of these require technology enablers. At the other end of the scale to drivers of improved customer centricity are business areas which compete with customer centric- ity for priority. We asked survey participants to rank the most important of these. In what could be read as a nudge to regu- lators to allow more investment in improving customer focus, the top ranking answer was financial constraints. Securing investment for any project is a challenge at the best of times, but given the immediate political and regulatory priority as we knuckle down for the final acts of PR14 and ED1 (and deliver T1 and GD1), affordability and funding could prove hard to come by. Wipro comment: prepare for extensive technology upgrade Utilities are poised for one of the biggest and most extensive technology upgrades in their operational history. 2014/15 will see them assess and adapt to the new world of multi-channel customer interac- tion and service. They will begin to create new roles – such as customer service di- rector and customer relationship manager – that need new technological tools. The business lexicon of utilities will begin to include words like digital, mobile, cloud, big data and analytic as they introduce technologies that bring them closer to the customer. Customers, who were largely seen as an aid to fault-finding in networks (when they called in with a complaint), will become the means to acquire funding and better pricing. The service incentive mech- anism, for example, encourages first-time resolution of complaints; companies that perform better on this metric are rewarded with higher price limits by regulators. Utili- ties must select their customer manage- ment technology with care: it can spell the difference between success and survival. wHat arE tHE most importaNt drivErs bEHiNd customEr cENtricity witHiN your compaNy? plEasE raNk tHE followiNg, witH tHE most importaNt drivErs towards tHE top. driver average water Electricity gas rank Considered necessary for business success 2.0 2.4 1.7 1.5 Response to customer feedback 2.7 3.3 2.0 2.0 Considered the right thing to do 2.7 2.1 3.4 3.0 Regulatory incentives and penalty mechanisms 4.2 3.3 5.4 4.5 Cost control 4.8 4.7 4.3 5.8 Required by investors 5.2 5.6 4.7 5.5 Government policy 6.4 6.6 6.4 5.8 Differential 4.2 4.7 4.4 coNfidENtially, oN a scalE of 1 to 5, wHat arE your ExpEctatioNs for How customEr cENtric your compaNy will bE iN 12 moNtHs' timE? coNfidENtially, oN a scalE of 1 to 5, How customEr cENtric is your compaNy at tHis poiNt iN timE? coNfidENtially, oN a scalE of 1 to 5, plEasE scorE your compaNy's customEr cENtricity iN EacH of tHE followiNg arEas 1 Very poor 2 3 4 5 Excellent 1 Very poor 2 3 4 5 Excellent 57% avg: 4.6 avg: 3.8 38% 62% 14% 24% 5% Customer loyalty mgt Customer mobile services Customer segmentation Customer self-service Social media integration Sales Despatch centre Control centre IVR voice & web integration New connections Customer comms Field services Call centre mgt Emergency mgt 1 = Very poor 5= Excellent 4.1 4.1 3.9 3.7 3.6 3.5 3.4 3.4 3.3 3.3 3.2 3.1 3.1 2.8