EDF Energy Launches Virtual Call Center Provided By Fluency Voice Technology

LONDON - EDF Energy, including London Energy, Seeboard Energy and SWEB Energy, which supplies energy services to over five million customer accounts in the UK, launched a speech recognition service for customers wanting to provide meter readings and pay their energy bills.

Developed by Fluency Voice Technology, the service has handled over nine million calls in the UK to date.

Mike Belton of EDF Energy, said, "As a major energy supplier we have the ongoing challenge of continually improving our levels of customer service and satisfaction, whilst improving operational efficiency. We wanted to offer our customers additional choice and convenience when dealing with us and were looking for an automated self-service system that was user-friendly, highly proficient and that gave a personalized service to our customers."

"Our chosen speech recognition system, developed by Fluency, went live in July and provides an excellent service for people wanting to provide a meter reading, pay their bills or find out their account balance. Our customers have been very welcoming of the virtual agents and we are seeing an increase in the number of people completing transactions compared to the old touchtone system."

The speech recognition system is powered by two of Fluency's speech recognition applications: PaymentCapture and IDVS (Identification and Verification with status), both of which form part of the Virtual Speech Agent (VSA) Suite™.

The applications within the VSA Suite have been designed to be "off-the-shelf." PaymentCapture enables payment for transactions, such as paying a balance. IDVS allows validation of customers before providing access to personal account information such as outstanding bill payment.

Belton added: "The Fluency speech system was the obvious choice for EDF Energy due to their experience in the utilities sector. The 'off-the-shelf' nature of the application meant that we didn't have the cost and risk of a bespoke development."

Try PaymentCapture for yourself by calling:

 +44 (0) 870 190 8030

You will need to use the sample account details below:

Reference number:         29330-2
Name:                           Richmond
Postcode:                     TD1 9JW
Credit Card No:              5301 2552 2880 6753 (or use your own)
Expiry Date:                  02/06