LANHAM, Md., April 18, 2007 - Group 1 Software, Inc., a Pitney Bowes Company (NYSE: PBI), today announced that it has been selected as a 2007 Billing World & OSS Today Excellence Awards finalist in the “Customer Success” category for its work with Grameenphone, the leading telecommunications service provider in Bangladesh, on a comprehensive Customer Communications Management (CCM) solution.
The winners of the 2007 Billing World & OSS Today Excellence Awards will be announced on April 25, 2007, at the Billing & OSS World 2007 Conference and Convention at McCormick Place in Chicago, IL. Group 1 Software will exhibit at the conference from April 25-27 in booth #708.
As a result of rapid growth, Grameenphone, which serves more than 12 million customers, faced considerable challenges communicating with its customers. Because of system limitations, it could not present product name and other meaningful data and marketing messages on invoices. Customer service representatives lacked access to exact replicas of invoices, or older invoices, leading to higher service costs and customer dissatisfaction. And, it could not support email communication, local languages, or on-demand customer service.
To address these challenges, Group 1 Software partnered with Grameenphone to design and implement a comprehensive CCM solution that provided seamless integration with Grameenphone’s existing billing, CRM, and data warehouse systems. Using Group 1 Software’s CCM technology, Grameenphone now has the ability to design more customer-centric invoices, with graphics, charts, and local language support. It can present product names, multi-level call categorization, and customer-specific marketing messages on invoices. Additionally, customer service representatives have near-instant access to exact replicas of current and past invoices for multiple years. Invoices can also be generated on-demand in real time, as needed, and can even be emailed to selected customers to reduce printing and mailing costs.
“The Customer Communication Management solution that Group 1 Software designed for Grameenphone has enabled us to significantly improve our invoicing, customer service and marketing capabilities,” said Syed Sohael Reza, head of the Revenue Management Systems Department of Grameenphone. “Customer reaction to the new invoices has been overwhelmingly positive, and we have significantly reduced service costs and customer dissatisfaction by providing CSRs with exact replicas of invoices to more quickly resolve problems.”
“Grameenphone wanted a solution that would enable them to manage all of their physical and electronic communications with their customers, both urban and rural, in-house, without external dependencies,” said Christopher Baker, president of Group 1 Software. “Leveraging our technology and extensive Professional Services capabilities, Group 1 Software was able to work with Grameenphone to implement such a solution, making effective use of their existing people, systems, and processes, and also meeting their aggressive implementation schedule.”
Group 1 Software’s CCM solution for Grameenphone has been in operation since November 2006. In total, the entire project, from requirements gathering and analysis, to final implementation and go live was completed in four months.
About Grameenphone
Grameenphone Ltd. is the largest telecommunications service provider in Bangladesh, with more than 12 million mobile phone users as of March 2007. A subsidiary of Telenor, it started operations in Bangladesh in 1997. Grameenphone is one of the largest private sector investments in the country.
About Group 1 Software
Group 1 Software (www.g1.com) turns data into results, providing innovative software solutions that enable our clients to better understand and connect with their millions of customers, prospects, and partners. Group 1 Software helps over 3,000 organizations maximize the value of customer data to improve profitability, increase effectiveness, and strengthen customer relationships, through consolidating, cleansing and enriching corporate data, and generating personalized business documents for multi-channel delivery, customer care and efficient business processing. Our comprehensive Customer Communications Management (CCM) solutions span from database to delivery, adding value to every aspect of communication and allowing clients to integrate intelligence throughout their mailstream. As part of Pitney Bowes (NYSE: PBI), a $5.6 billion company, Group 1 Software’s solutions are utilized by leaders in the insurance, financial services/banking, GIS/mapping, government, mail services, retail, telecommunications, utility, and other industries, including Entergy, ING, L.L. Bean, MapQuest, Microsoft, Safeco Insurance, Wal-Mart and Wells Fargo.
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