BT Tel: Electronically Channeled Service Center

Accenture helped BT Tel create a virtual, electronically channeled service center, delivering cost-effective services via the Internet for two of its most important assets: customers and dealers.

With more competitors entering the open market, BT Tel wanted to reposition itself as the leading Spanish multimedia company, offering an Internet-empowered "business port" for managing and strengthening relationships with customers and business partners.

For private customers, BT Tel knew that electronic contact was a must. Not only would it help attract new customers and sustain a high level of customer satisfaction, it would also help position BT Tel as a dynamic and advanced electronic commerce operator in the middle market. Particularly for corporate, strategic customer segments, use of the Web would strengthen relationships and streamline the processes for order entry, trouble ticketing, order and fault tracking, and reporting.

The relationship with business partners was an equally critical factor. BT Tel chose to use independent dealers—external, small enterprises—to sell their services. Without guaranteed exclusivity, the dealer would, in many cases, also sell products and services from BT Tel's competitors. By providing their business partners with easy-to-use, valuable, informative and pervasive sales tools, BT Tel could attain a more loyal, higher revenue generating relationship with dealers.

BT Tel would seek to create a virtual, electronically channeled service center, delivering cost-effective services via the Internet for two of its most important assets: customers and dealers.

BT Tel selected Accenture to help it approach its electronic customer service initiative. A well-rounded team, comprising BT Tel, BT Europe, Sun-Netscape and Accenture professionals, went swiftly into project development at the Accenture Delivery Center in Madrid, Spain.

They devised a powerful architecture for real-time integration and information exchange with BT Tel's key operations support systems. New content and features to support the launch of new services were incorporated into Ventana BT, BT Tel's existing public website platform. Using Netscape Application Server as the platform for deploying the electronic services helped ensure the most secure environments for authentication, profiling, and data privacy.

Behind the attractive Internet front-end interface, the team enabled robust, electronic business functions, including electronic call center service, order management, account management, opportunity and quote/order management, billing and rating.

Launched in May 1999, the customer and dealer electronic service applications in Ventana BT are changing the sales and customer service landscape for BT Tel. Some 45 percent of the new contracts garnered by dealers are received directly via the Web. Nearly 300 dealers using the dealer application find the workflow much simpler as quotes are entered directly into the system.

Any BT Tel customer may gain access to manage his services via Ventana BT. Customers can view their billing information, add new products or request help for service trouble using the Web. The customer service application, currently accessed by approximately 2,500 customers, is considered by some to be the most advanced in the Spanish telecommunications market.

"The word 'Ventana' literally means 'a window into'," commented Mr. Victor Bravo, Chief Information Officer of BT Tel. "Accenture brought an overall understanding of the close relationship between our operations support and call systems and the external world. They were in a unique position to help us use emerging technology to open a window into our operations systems and better interact with our customers and partners."