Making changes for maximum impact

Innovation roadblocks

One of North America’s most experienced submetering providers, Metergy Solutions has over 500,000 water, gas and electricity meters under contract — and processes some two million invoices annually. Its turnkey solutions cover all types of buildings and apartment rentals, right down to individual suites. And it helps customers generate up to 40% in savings simply by having access to their own meter readings.

The Metergy contact center usually serves as the first point of contact, but it was being held back by manual processes and complex Avaya on-premises technology. As a digital-first business, Metergy wanted to combine its professional web services with native omnichannel customer experience capabilities delivered from the cloud.

“Our vision for customer experience was one where agents could quickly locate information, provide accurate guidance on bills and educate customers on usage and the best ways to manage their consumption,” said Maudrie Smith, Director of Customer Care Operations at Metergy. “We wanted agents to be friendly and obliging.”

A rapid move to remote work

Metergy spent over a year evaluating solutions before settling on the Genesys Cloud™ platform.

“We wanted to get more hands-on and self-serve, rather than keep relying on slow and costly external support,” added Smith. “Genesys Cloud was definitely the easiest to maneuver and had all the services we had on our wish list. And it was the first time in my entire career that I’ve implemented a major project in 10 weeks.”

Soon after, the COVID-19 pandemic struck. Metergy faced unforeseen challenges in protecting its people, services and revenue as it quickly transitioned to remote work.

“There were no hiccups whatsoever and customers didn’t even realize our agents were working from home,” said Smith. “We were successfully set up by 10 AM and taking calls and emails. Everything responded and worked exactly the way it did when we were in the office.”

Efficiency gains

Metergy wasted no time in leveraging new Genesys features. Previously, because all its calls and emails were routed manually, there used to be an element of “cherry-picking.” Agents would select the easiest jobs first, resulting in more difficult tasks going back to the queue. Now, with Genesys Cloud, they must handle and complete each job in the order it’s presented before progressing to the next one.

Enhanced data access has also helped to speed up service.

“Unlike before, when a call is fed through, our agent can see all the customer’s information on their screen,” said Smith. “So, they can personally greet them by name and speed up verifications. And, because our agents are fully blended, they can work on emails or other tasks while they’re waiting for calls.”

Informed resource management

Now firmly meshed into daily operations, Genesys Workforce Engagement Management has been used to gather information on call trends and how many agents were needed over a six-month period.

In addition, Metergy has leveraged quality management tools to record and evaluate its agents and their interactions.

“Genesys Workforce Engagement Management has amazing reporting features that highlight non-compliance,” said Smith. “When a call or email comes in, we’re able to score the interaction and share that with the agent, who is often unaware of their behavior. We can then arrange coaching sessions to help mentor and improve their performance.”

Overall, these improvements have contributed to a 30% increase in agent productivity and a 2% rise in CSAT. “And our rates for absentees and lates are now literally zero,” added Smith.

Enhanced independence and control

Greater freedom to self-serve has also made a big difference. For example, a call queue for an e-billing campaign was set up, tested and ready to go within 10 minutes. “Prior to Genesys Cloud, we would have had to pay a vendor to do that for us,” said Smith.

Now, Metergy plans to introduce webchat and artificial intelligence-powered bots that will empower agents to deal with more complex tasks.

“Our people plus Genesys Cloud makes superhuman service,” concluded Smith. “It means our agents are equipped to do their jobs using the right tools, providing information that the customer can understand in a fast and efficient way.”