The regular billing cycle is often a company's most consistent
customer contact point, and when coupled with web processes can
become one of the most potent aids in a company's relationship with
its customers.
According to Forrester Research, the revenue potential for
companies supplying electronic bill presentation and payment (EBPP)
solutions to business-to-business (B2B) e-business industries is
set to leap from 1999's $32m (£20m) to $1bn (£625m) in 2004.
Pundits assert that utilities especially need to offer e-billing to
industrial customers by 2002 if they are to survive.
The EBPP company idesk differentiates itself by offering
in-house technical help desk and customer support operations
'capable of handling consumer and business bill or technical
queries' which are related to the likes of service provision.
Customers include Cable & Wireless, Virgin, WorldOnLine and
Worldcom. London based idesk is an ASP and e-services company, and
recently introduced outsourced internet driven EBPP product
ebility, which it claims can reduce billing overheads associated
with paper based print/mail by 50-75 per cent.
The core of ebility comprises software from US based Solant,
based on object-oriented principles, and built on Java and
WebObjects software design standards, ie open, flexible, and
capable of being implemented into in-house systems. Other companies
selling EBPP software include eDocs, and IBM in conjunction with
BlueGill - Big Blue re-markets BlueGill's i-Series, adding
consulting and integration services.
idesk md David Saul, says: 'We expect over 50 per cent of our
business to be business-to-business two years hence. Looking three
to five years out we expect business-to-consumer to be big. We're
collecting as much data as we can now. We have two customers under
trial - an electricity utility and US telco. We're doing trials
with the utility on both business-to-business and
business-to-consumer, the former having the ramifications. The
telco is business-to-consumer.'
Saul points out the problems in the e-billing arena:
slim adoption rate; it's expected to be more than two years
before e-billing is adopted
getting access to the savings e-billing provides; it requires
process re-engineering internally. If a company has an in-house
print-shop and call centre, with prints and calls reducing, there
are still fixed overheads. It's difficult to make savings until
there's full take-up of e-billing.
the complexity the market is adopting. APACS (automated payment
and clearing services) sets the rules for clearing, while the
associated banks' clearing arm BACS does it. APACS is currently
attempting to develop a common standard for payment processing, to
have access to summary billing data.
'Looking at the latter point, under the ASP model, you take the
raw data to the market,' says Saul. 'The market takes it in summary
form. Banks want to get summary data and offer it to their
customers.'
Other players now want to dip in the market (the UK's clearing
market is worth over £27bn a year). There's World Pay (in which
NatWest had a stake) and US based CheckFree 'which wants to come to
Europe'.
The full scope of the internet has yet to be realised. With web
based billing the soupe du jour, the simplest solution would appear
to be to add a web front end to the legacy application. However,
Tenfold argues this offers no functionality additions.
Mike Pilcher, Tenfold vp e-business, says: 'The approach is to
develop a web-enabled billing system which replaces outdated legacy
applications, and has the flexibility to be re-modelled and
developed later.
'Our approach means we begin projects with 75 per cent of an
application's functionality pre-built. This enables testing and
customisation of the application - we've already developed
web-enabled billing applications in the utilities and telecom
sectors,' says Pilcher.
This is a confusing market where most tangible cost savings can
be seen in the business-to-business sector. Popular opinion might
think it was in the business-to-consumer e-commerce market.
Richard Cooper, general manager of Windsor based Microgen, says:
'Our activity in business-to-business is driven by our relations
with top customers.' Microgen operates out of Swindon which deals
with customer relationship management and business intelligence
consultancy.' Wellingborough and Welwyn Garden City, the main site
for online document management and e-billing.
Cooper reckons Microgen's online electronic document management
services represent some 10 per cent of business today, 'but over
five years this is expected to take up most of the company's
business'.
'This business has grown quickly, and we now have 27 companies
signed up,' says Cooper. He adds: 'Pioneer Concrete, part of Hanson
Group, is one example. All the others are big organisations -
building wholesalers, coffee supplies, volume IT, aggregates
suppliers, stationery providers - companies where there's regular
volume and many invoices.
'We're using the ASP - application service provider - model,'
says Cooper. 'Not putting the bill in the post any more brings
savings of 30 per cent. You don't need paper. We can sit down with
finance people and show them where they can save money - tangible
cost savings today. Intangibles are quicker delivery, seeing bills
on the web page, and seeing customers have looked at and downloaded
them.'
Portal Software, with a focus on IP billing, has notched up a
client base in Europe including France Telecom, T-Online, and
Telenor. Portal recently signed BuildNet, an e-business initiative
for the building industry. Emea product manager Stuart Potchinsky
says: 'The key point to make for a billing system is it must bill
for the value of the content that's being sent. Equally there must
be provision to bill in a number of different ways in
real-time.
'Think of MP3 files, video and radio downloaded over the
internet to digital TVs, hand-sets, web pads and PCs - and how you
bill.'
Global supplier of e-business applications Broadvision, with 600
customers, including BT, Vodafone, RS Components, Motorola, Ernst
& Young ,and Hewlett-Packard, reckons some 80 per cent of its
business falls into the B2B e-business category. The company
maintains that its One-to-One billing package lets users customise
billing messages based on customer profiles, account status or
history, billing data and site usage.
Jon West, marketing director at systems integrator IS Solutions,
says: 'With Broadvision's One-to-One billing package, profiles and
content are both available to the core engine, which enables the
delivery of relevant customer information. Other applications can
be built on top of the engine. In the business-to-business space,
managers can run analytics, compare industry standards and cost by
department, for example.'
He continues: 'We see a strong future in business-to-consumer.
'While business-to-consumer is low margin, the potential to
increase revenue is enormous - through up- and cross-selling. Sure,
e-billing does reduce costs, but that's not the fundamental reason
to put it in.'
Hugh MacDonald, telecom practice leader, Tanning Technology,
says: 'With e-billing in business-to-business, the key is what
value add there is for the company from the information
underpinning the bill.' Tanning is a systems integrator currently
working with telcos and banks.
Scottish software house KSCL, developer of the first GSM billing
system, reckons its customers look for an ability to make the
product bespoke, and ability to add/subtract modules easily for 'a
close relationship that solves problems'.
Whereas paper bill print/post costs total up to £2.50, e-billing
has no costs after initial set-up fees. If customers, says
e-business software specialist DST Innovis, use the internet
instead of the call centre, service providers save £3-5 per
transaction. To enable payment via the web, the company's interface
to the internet communicates with customer database and billing
information. DST's market is telecom, video/broadband and
utilities. The first UK utility to offer e-billing uses DST
software.
IS Solutions' West says: 'There's an opportunity because the
person receiving the bill is already a captive audience for the
business sending it.'
In developing user profiles from bills, companies can
cross/up-sell and generally trade over and above just settling
billed loot. Horrors.
The winner in IP billing? The systems supplier which can show a
fully-operational working system that handles IP interconnection
the way people want in their own network. l
Date in Cannes
Geneva Technology is providing Portuguese telco Maxitel billing
systems for business and residential billing for voice telephony,
plus IP and ISP services.
l Hot-foot to Cannes, France, 27-30 November, for the 'Billing
2000 Global' exhibition. More from The Phillips Group
(www.billing.co.uk)
Mediation software
Barron McCann has developed a banking mediation software
package for billing systems. So far the software has focused on
international direct debits, but the company is considering how to
handle payments through a web site. One customer wants to offer
credit card and direct debit payment on its web site. The reason?
Direct debits are more secure, and anyone planning to use the site
regularly can just call off direct debits as they spend. Plus there
are the benefits of direct debit security. The software has been
bought for use in billing systems run by CSG, Dolphin Telecom, NTL
Ireland, and Telint, Germany. It works through an integrator (PWC,
Unisys, CAP-Gemini for use in Geneva Technology billing
systems).