Tuesday, August 4. 2009Automating Key Systems Is A Never Ending TaskJohn Linton Exetel has, from its inception, designed its methods of operation on automating as much as possible and, over the past five plus years we have continued to develop new processes and constantly go back and redesign previous processes to meet the over riding goal of operating the company's ordering, provisioning, billing, collection and support systems with as little manual intervention as we can make possible. From what I know of other similar companies operational processes, our five years of dedication to this process has produced an incredibly efficient company....and we now have more resources devoted to our automation projects than at any previous time. One thing that we have done better than any other company I have ever been associated with is our billing process that automatically blocks a user's access to their service if their monthly direct debit to their bank account or credit card fails. The block has the option for the customer to make a payment using an alternate financial institution which, if it is successful, will return the service within 20 minutes. We implemented this simple, and highly effective, process some four years ago and it has worked very well ever since with very few customers not paying on time and virtually no manual follow up required by Exetel and therefore no 'credit control' personnel when a customer fails to pay a bill. It is probably one of our most successful pieces of automation and a key part of allowing Exetel to provide the lowest possible cost communication services. However, in this nanny State world of the 21st century there are always the helpless and the argumentative and the just plain unreasonable people who consider that their personal failures and inadequacies of managing their financial affairs in a way that their known financial obligations are discharged on time is, somehow, Exetel's fault. Every month we get something around 1,000 customers whose debits fail and of those 100 people bitterly complaining that we have 'cut off' their service for the trivial reason that they haven't paid for it - "how dare you treat a loyal customer like that" (the other 900 or so just pay within a few minutes of seeing they have been blocked due, usually, to a new credit card end date which despite our many reminders they didn't bother to change). I won't list the other most common 'cries de couer' - they are truly pathetic for someone out of kindergarten to try and offer as a reason why they shouldn't be "inconvenienced just because they don't pay their bill" but most suggest we should telephone them to see what the problem is and then extend them additional time to deal with their financial issues....because they are 'special'. We obviously can't do that for all the reasons that anyone who has ever tried to call 1,000 people 'during working hours' would know....no-one ever answers the telephone. Similarly sending an email will only get a "never got the email" response...etc....etc. So from yesterday's billing run we have refined the failed debit blocking system by still blocking the service but now providing a second option besides the "pay now or remain blocked" situation that has pertained for the last four or so years. The customer can now restore their service without paying (this is for the 100 or so poor people whose personal finances are more complex than an updated credit card or using a bank account with no money in it). By taking this option they gain a 'grace period' of 72 hours of restored service (so they can use their internet banking to sort out their problems) and only if they fail to make a payment within that time will their service again be blocked - this time 'permanently' - or at least until they pay for it. I am going to be very interested to see whether this new process reduces/eliminates the bitter complainants who can't understand that it is their responsibility to manage their own financial affairs not Exetel's. I'm not holding my breath - I'm waiting to be surprised at the new wave of complaints of "what do you expect me to be able to do in a mere three days" type protestations. Perhaps this means that I'm far too cynical to play a part in managing a "customer focused" business - "customer focus" seems to me to mean screwing up suppliers, banks, personnel and your own sanity for the sake of not displeasing some unreasonable and inept person who couldn't care less about anyone but themselves. Roll on vacation time. Trackbacks
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Customers complaining when you aren't costing them anything additional? Most ISP's will hit you for $5-20+ for late/failed payments.
I think "pay now or remain blocked" in your article is actually the first option, what's the second option actually called? Comment (1)
I didn't think it needed a name - perhaps:
"Payment option for the perennially late"? Comments (5)
Perhaps you could have a system where the number of days grace Exetel offers is equal to the number of months the customer has been in good standing, divided by 3 or 4.
e.g. 2 years of trouble-free payment followed by a missed payment = 6 or 8 days grace. Might be a solution in search of a problem, though. Comment (1)
I suppose actually doing what you say you'll do doesn't count as a bonus to me.
I realise I'm very old fashioned. Comments (5)
One suggestion that has been discussed a couple of times on the forum is the idea of running one's Exetel account in credit. It hasn't gained much traction on the forum so maybe it wasn't that well received, however I'll raise it hear (this time for the last time - promise).
The concept being that one who struggles with a tight budget may prefer a smaller regular weekly amount rather than a monthly. It is almost a quasi prepaid service. I've noticed it as the preferred method for some of the other low cost VSPs. The customer could set up a direct credit from teh bank / credit card to their exetel account of $20 per week. This would cover an $80pm service with a little bit of fat. The only time Extel would need to debit a credit card would be if the invoice amount took the account into debt. It changes the obligation to the customer to 'push' money rather than Exetel 'pull' at invoice time. Taking it a little further, I have seen it set up as a credit card auto top up. That is, when my Exetel account gets to $10 charge $20 to give a new balance of $30. This would be excellent for the PAYU style plans. For your consideration... Comment (1)
That's not a bad idea - so long as the payments are processed via credit card / debit card, it'd be very easy to setup as well - simply add a 'add credit to my account' in members facilities, and modify billing to check that first before debiting (and consume all available credit, and debit difference).
Comment (1)
About five of my customers who use me as a proxy service use this option. (They pay me ahead of time, and Exetel debits me as normal.)
Comments (2)
Actually, if this sort of system was implemented - that is a customer can nominate to deposit money into Exetel rather than Exetel remove it; you might get more customers.
About 15% of the customers I have with Exetel would not have signed up if they had to use DD or CC since they don't trust anyone to have access to their accounts. (Even I won't give Telstra DD access.) If you were to have a BPAY or EFT mechanism that the customer could use to voluntarily recharge their account, I think that would be good. The one automation challenge would be working out who deposited what since it seems 10% of people who pay by EFT put your name instead of theirs in the reference field! Comments (2)
The "Because no-one is Perfect" defence.
John, I must commend you on both aspects of your policy. It is because you have implemented such stringent payment rules that allows you to provide us with the lowest cost Internet Services in Australia. This actually allows me to know exactly when you will take the money from my account (with my previous ISP I never knew when it would happen). Another automated Exetel system allows me to order a VoIP service and have it working 20 minutes later, no matter what time of the day I order it. The problem arises when the customer works in 'set and forget mode' (with the emphasis on forget). Not everyone's pay goes into the bank or bills come out on the same calendar month cycle, so it is not always easy to know that money is going to be there. Using dbr's suggestion, I would be able to transfer money (push) to Exetel on a fortnightly basis, straight after my pay goes in, for example. The problem I have seen with Exetel's automated responses to a breach, whether that be payment, virus, SPAM or usage, is that the first time it is encountered, the first reaction is to think that your session has been hijacked by a virus and this message could not be coming from Exetel!! My only experience was a relative who got a block related to SPAM coming from his PC. It took him several days before he accepted that the message was from Exetel. So, it is good that you have built a little more Grace into the failed payment block. Just like you keep asking for your customers not to hurl abuse at Exetel for everything that goes wrong, Exetel customers are asking for that Grace when we don't always do the right thing, "Because no-one is Perfect". Comments (2)
I have problems with the "set and forget" - surely it can't be too hard to keep track of what charges are coming from your bank account and when, and adjust for it?
I keep a "calendar" in a spreadsheet, and all the various charges that come from my account (rent, Exetel, other services) are listed against the date they are due, and there are entries for when income arrives - thus I always know what funds I have to play with over the next few weeks. If someone's financial situation is such that they don't know if they'll have enough funds in their account to meet a regular as clockwork monthly commitment, then I'd question their ability to afford whatever they are paying for. Comment (1)
My guess is only 5% of people would actively use any kind of mechanism to track their finances as you suggest.
Most people are not even spending their own money to pay their bills, shown by the number of people who use of a credit card as the method of payment. In today's society it is all too easy to spend money (My spending capacity always seems to exceed my earning capacity), and most people are too busy enjoying the fruits of that spending to worry about tracking their bills. Comments (2)
I try to pay by credit card, for the free loyalty points.
I too keep a payment-due list, ever since the power company broke my mailing address, and sent reminders, final notices and disconnection notices to a non-existing address. Because I never got the bill, I didn't know this, until I came home to a warm fridge. The grace period is the way to go. Comment (1)
We it be wise to give them access to the net for 72 hours, but cap there speed at 64kb/s? Some people who have no intention of paying may take advantage of the grace period to hammer there downloads before leaving for good.
If I had the grace period I would be happy to have a basic speed just so i could access the sites i needed to get to, to make a payment... Comment (1)
Our problem is we never realise that there are total assh***s in the world.
Comments (5)
I know the feeling John, and most of my customers are business customers! Oh it must be so hard for some of my customers to manage the $20-30 a month payment on the every changing billing day of the first of the month! It just must be so hard for them.
I do first of the month billing with invoices issued 14 days before hand, and suspended 7 days past due. The account needs to be paid on the first of each month. On the second of any month its over due and we send notices each day for the next 6 days, and cut them off on the 7th with a late fee issued to their invoice. Now I'm super nice and don't allow our automated system to suspend their accounts on the weekend or Fridays, but that's changing soon as they can reactivate any time with a credit card on our website God help you if their credit card payment declines due to their expired card, I had one on Monday send me a nasty email about sending them a payment failed notice (automated email which says the payment failed, please update your credit card details on our website or feel free to pay by direct deposit here is our bank details). Turns out they ignored the 4 credit card expiry notices we sent during the month. We get the exact same response from our small business customers as you get from residential customers "why didn't you call me!!". So I'm currently in the process of creating a few scripts which will grab overdue accounts, and interface with Asterisk and call the clowns who can't manage to pay the tiny bills we send them, and play them a polite recording along the lines of "Kindly call us, to discuss your account". Now we've called them, spent the 10c which will be recovered back in their $10 late fee to reactivate services! Have you ever tried to actually call these people that want to be called? They are really nasty to you, like "how dare you call me about my bill, I'll pay it when I dame well feel like"! We already send SMS alerts (at a small expense to my business) to customers to remind them of important renewal reminders yet still get angry calls about not doing enough to let them know about the pending renewal required, after 4-6 SMS over a 3 month period, emails and automatically raising an invoice. That said, my monthly payment to Exetel will always be accepted as our business account comes with a free $500 temporary overdraft protection from the CBA bank :~) Comment (1)
Your system sounds very comprehensive.
At the end of the day we share the same view of the only two things that matter: 1) You get every cent you're owed 2) You reduce the cost of getting every cent you're owed to the absolute minimum. You have noticed the pointlessness of contact with a customer who defaults on a payment - they take out their 'shame/embarrassment' by abusing the person who contacts them. We remove that by having them talk to a computer screen. Comments (5)
.... and all this frustration from a customer who nets you around $1 per month?
H. Comment (1)
It's a sobering thought.
Comments (5)
the usage block has failed me a few times. It doesn't work under certain modem setups so I saw no page and had no idea what was wrong. If it could have emailed me when the payment failed and blocked me 24+ hours later, I would have known... or maybe Exetel could auto-send one of those cheap SMS messages to my nominated mobile contact number (that would be AWESOME!!! )
Comment (1)
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