Standardise and streamline services and service billing

Our client is a statutory state-owned corporation who supply water, wastewater, recycled water and some stormwater services to over five million people. They also maintain water quality and asset performance, manage the economic level of water conservation, and environmental indicators and management.

Utility services and maintenance

Define and improve the process of service delivery and billing in context of new residences so as to provide better customer experience and reduced revenue leakage

The process was defined and analysed quickly and easily using the Open Orbit platform. Change recommendations covered a wide range of improvements, including internal process changes and the development of a standardised billing philosophy. This resulted in increased cashflow throughout the entire process and ensured accurate and auditable timesheet records were kept, reducing leakage in the form of unbilled staff actions.

The team members were not change practitioners and needed to manage their project time around their everyday work. This was especially challenging when the project leader was required to manage additional responsibilities at short notice.

There was no standardisation to when billing was completed throughout the process, resulting in years of services rendered without any remuneration for them. It was also identified that there was no billing agreement with clients confirming what would be charged for or when.

The traditional project working model of in person workshops and meetings was not an option for this project. Due to the new working environment required due to COVID19, the team members needed to adjust to the new way of working.

By using Open Orbit, the project team were able to work on their projects as time allowed; independently or together. With as little as 2hrs per week, the projects had progressed to the point of recommending solutions (complete with implementation action plan) in weeks, rather than months.

The project team members were able to utilise the presentation and reporting tools within Open Orbit to communicate the details of the problem to stakeholders and leadership teams quickly and simply. This was done without the need for manually converting Open Orbit artifacts and learnings to PowerPoint and other reporting tools.

Open Orbit’s unique algorithm pushed the team to “shine the light in all corners of the room”. The mind maps encouraged the discovery of the true root causes – guiding the project team members to challenge any preconceived notions of what the cause of the problem might be.

Open Orbit allows for remote collaboration between project members. Multiple users were able to work on the project at the same time, with changes being updated live. This reduced the need for full workshops as work could be done in tandem both in and out of meetings.