LANHAM, Md., October 09, 2007 - Group 1 Software, Inc., a Pitney Bowes Company (NYSE: PBI), today announced that Thomas Cook AG has selected its e2™ Customer Communications Management (CCM) solution to deliver personalized travel booklets to its tourism customers.
In the coming weeks, clients who book a trip with the German catalogs of Thomas Cook AG will receive a personalized travel booklet containing address labels, rail and airline vouchers, flight information vouchers or alternative flight coupons, hotel vouchers, as well as any gift vouchers. The documents are sorted by itinerary and are individually detachable for the various services. Following its introduction in Germany, the new service will be rolled out in Belgium, France, the Netherlands, Austria, Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic.
“Group 1 Software’s CCM solution has made believers out of us“, said Jürgen Neumann, head of Shared Services Customer Documents at Thomas Cook AG. “One module of the solution performs the formatting of the forms that go in the booklet. In addition, the department can create electronic inserts, such as information about the destination area, entry requirements, and notes about carry-on luggage or contacts – all without the support of the IT department. With the booklets, customers have all the important travel information handy at a glance. In addition, we can speak to the customers individually and significantly improve customer communication.”
Thomas Cook AG began optimizing their customer communication in 2005. In the search for a suitable solution for coordinated customer communication management, the company set four priorities which were realized in cooperation with Group 1 Software: access to customer information from various data sources; provision of this information via the different corporate applications; uniform document formatting and generation for more efficiency in production and distribution via diverse communications channels; and, the possibility to archive customer information centrally and quickly retrieve it in order to provide high-quality service in answering customer inquiries.
“Thomas Cook recognizes the benefits of personalized communications for improving customer experience and increasing customer loyalty,” said Alan Slater, vice president and general manager of Customer Communication Management for Group 1 Software. “Group 1 Software’s end-to-end CCM solutions provide a complete suite of tools for delivering the right message to the right customer at the right time.”
Group 1 Software’s solution for Thomas Cook AG includes the e2 suite, an application for electronic billing and electronic bill presentment, as well as electronic payment. The e2 suite makes it possible for both the department, as well as customer service, to display exact replicas of the booklets as a PDF file. In addition, the CCM solution automatically performs the print control of the individual forms and recognizes at booking level where the documents must be delivered for printing.
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.
e2, Group 1, Group 1 Software, and the Group 1 logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Group 1 Software, Inc. Pitney Bowes and the Pitney Bowes Process Bar Design are trademarks or registered trademarks of Pitney Bowes, Inc. All other brand names and trademarks are the property of their respective owners.