This arti­cle was brought to you by ASUG and UiPath.

When there’s a dis­rup­tion in the ser­vice a util­i­ty pro­vides, life stops. Cus­tomers expect pow­er, gas, and water will flow when they need them. And it’s a big job to main­tain the infra­struc­ture and sup­ply chains that keep things run­ning. But util­i­ties are find­ing that, in addi­tion to pro­vid­ing com­mu­ni­ties with essen­tial ser­vices, they’re also in the busi­ness of man­ag­ing cus­tomer rela­tion­ships. Whether a util­i­ty faces stiff com­pe­ti­tion in a dereg­u­lat­ed mar­ket or is the sole provider in a giv­en com­mu­ni­ty, the cus­tomer expe­ri­ence matters.

Today’s util­i­ty cus­tomers want reli­able ser­vice — but they also want mul­ti-chan­nel engage­ment, proac­tive com­mu­ni­ca­tions, billing trans­paren­cy, and account­abil­i­ty on envi­ron­men­tal impact. And with AI-pow­ered automa­tion, util­i­ties can deliv­er. AI and automa­tion com­bine to empow­er cus­tomers, trans­form self-ser­vice, and help util­i­ty com­pa­nies antic­i­pate cus­tomer sen­ti­ment to lever­age and fuel bet­ter cus­tomer expe­ri­ences. In dereg­u­lat­ed mar­kets, supe­ri­or cus­tomer expe­ri­ence is a com­pet­i­tive dif­fer­en­tia­tor. And, in any mar­ket, it can help raise the qual­i­ty of ser­vice while low­er­ing costs.

Empow­er­ing cus­tomers to help themselves

Rates and reli­a­bil­i­ty. They’re the most obvi­ous fac­tors that deter­mine a customer’s sat­is­fac­tion with a util­i­ty. But what more do cus­tomers want? The abil­i­ty to help them­selves. That’s why inno­v­a­tive util­i­ties are look­ing for ways to take the fric­tion and effort out of being a customer.

Cus­tomers want easy access to infor­ma­tion on billing, pay­ments, planned and unplanned out­ages, and mov­ing meters. A line item can con­fuse them on a bill, and they need clar­i­fi­ca­tion. And they always want to know when and why ser­vice is dis­rupt­ed. Answer­ing these ques­tions and proac­tive­ly man­ag­ing cus­tomer expec­ta­tions cre­ate the foun­da­tion of a great cus­tomer expe­ri­ence. And cus­tomers increas­ing­ly expect per­son­al­ized and respon­sive engage­ment. But knowl­edge­able con­tact cen­ter agents are in short sup­ply. So, util­i­ties need anoth­er way to get cus­tomers the sup­port they need.

Automat­ing self-ser­vice for bet­ter experiences

With the com­bi­na­tion of gen­er­a­tive AI and automa­tion, util­i­ties can offer cus­tomers advanced self-ser­vice options that con­nect them with infor­ma­tion and sup­port on-demand, across exist­ing chan­nels such as voice and chat. Intel­li­gent vir­tu­al assis­tants can access mul­ti­ple sys­tems and deliv­er the right infor­ma­tion to resolve cus­tomer issues at the first point of con­tact — and they can step cus­tomers through the com­ple­tion of many account- and order-relat­ed tasks.

Automa­tion also ensures that self-ser­vice keeps get­ting bet­ter. Com­mu­ni­ca­tions min­ing taps AI capa­bil­i­ties to iden­ti­fy requests accu­rate­ly, under­stand sen­ti­ment, and extract impor­tant data from mes­sages such as emails, tick­ets, and cas­es. Those insights help improve self-ser­vice for move-in/­move-out requests, billing dis­putes, and ser­vice sta­tus inquiries. Cus­tomers get faster res­o­lu­tion, and util­i­ty employ­ees are freed up to focus on oth­er tasks.

UiPath analy­sis shows that expand­ing self-ser­vice improves Net Pro­mot­er Score (NPS) by five points at 1/​20th the cost. And that’s good news for util­i­ties, in com­pet­i­tive mar­kets as well as reg­u­lat­ed mar­kets. As util­i­ties work to keep the lights on, self-ser­vice helps ensure great cus­tomer ser­vice is always on as well.

Trans­form­ing process­es for a cus­tomer-cen­tric approach

AI-pow­ered automa­tion can bridge the gaps between incom­pat­i­ble sys­tems and break down the oper­a­tional silos with­in a util­i­ty to keep the orga­ni­za­tion on course and focused on cus­tomer needs.

Even the best-per­form­ing util­i­ties under­go out­ages and can expe­ri­ence spikes in cus­tomer com­plaints. Automa­tion can help by iden­ti­fy­ing issues and esca­lat­ing cas­es that are approach­ing ser­vice lev­el agree­ment (SLA) breach­es. With the ana­lyt­i­cal horse­pow­er of AI and machine learn­ing, util­i­ty com­pa­nies can zero in on root caus­es and spot his­tor­i­cal trends that enter­prise lead­ers may not even be aware of.

The com­bi­na­tion of AI and automa­tion can also help util­i­ties be more effi­cient and proac­tive in field ser­vice. AI-pow­ered automa­tion helps field ser­vice tech­ni­cians save time and elim­i­nate errors in record-keep­ing, diag­nos­tics, and rou­tine main­te­nance tasks. It also makes real-time deci­sion-mak­ing more pre­cise to improve the safe­ty and effi­cien­cy of field oper­a­tions. And it helps util­i­ties iden­ti­fy and address poten­tial ser­vice and infra­struc­ture prob­lems before they affect the cus­tomer experience.

And because util­i­ties gen­er­ate so much data on cus­tomers, mar­kets, trans­ac­tions, and com­peti­tors, AI-pow­ered automa­tion fuels the knowl­edge man­age­ment best prac­tices that are the foun­da­tion for per­son­al­ized ser­vice. Util­i­ties will be able to bet­ter pre­dict cus­tomer needs and offer the exact bun­dle of ser­vices that best serve those needs — ulti­mate­ly reduc­ing churn, boost­ing reten­tion rates, and dri­ving up NPS scores.

Plug­ging into a bet­ter cus­tomer experience

Automa­tion is the mech­a­nism for turn­ing AI capa­bil­i­ties into real-world solu­tions. For util­i­ties, AI-pow­ered automa­tion opens up new pos­si­bil­i­ties for the cus­tomer experience. 

Lead­ing util­i­ties know that an engag­ing, seam­less cus­tomer expe­ri­ence shouldn’t be an after­thought. It’s now a com­pet­i­tive neces­si­ty. AI-pow­ered automa­tion can help util­i­ties make cus­tomer expe­ri­ence (CX) the foun­da­tion for sus­tain­able com­pet­i­tive advantage. 

For more on UiPath solu­tions, vis­it us online.

This arti­cle was brought to you by UiPath. ASUG devel­ops and pub­lish­es insights reg­u­lar­ly in part­ner­ship with its mem­bers and cus­tomers. For more infor­ma­tion on ASUG spon­sored con­tent, con­tact isaac.​feldberg@​asug.​com.