Customer Engagement – Smart Meters

This Texas-based company provides electricity and energy services to retail customers in the United States. The company provides service to approximately 1.8 million retail electricity customers primarily in Texas, including residential and small business customers. The company also serves commercial, industrial, governmental and institutional customers in US Northeast. 

Overview

To address the issues this energy provider in supply-side asset utilization, they focused on assisting customers in better managing their consumption of energy.  Energy providers need to plan based on peak demands, which are hit during weather events such as prolonged heat waves.  When the weather returns to normal, demand drops well below peak levels and along with it, revenues fall.  Enabling the customer to make informed purchase decisions would smooth out demand during these peak periods, leading to fewer capital investments needed.

Strategy and Goals

Increase the engagement of customers in an informed decision process which will lead to smoother levels of consumption and less infrastructure investment.

A key element of this initiative is a customer portal that provides real-time utilization data, provide pricing incentives to more actively manage energy consumption, and deliver advice on energy savings.

The key features of the Smart Energy Web Portal are:

• Illustrate power use and cost in real-time
• Enable customers to make clear and timely decisions
• Explain power in terms they can understand
• Provide tools to control usage and cost when it counts
• Energy Savings Projects – Detailed instructions and walkthroughs on valuable energy-saving projects such as calking, adding attic insulation, landscaping, and lighting maintenance.
• Energy Checkup – This tool helps residential customers improve, analyze, learn and save on energy.
• Energy Experts@company.com – Company experts respond online to customer questions with customized tips and information.

The Final Results

The Smart Energy initiative will allow the company to:

• Empower the demand side by delivering market price signals  directly to customers
• Put information, choice, and control in the hands of the customers
• Create insights that result in customer energy consumption decisions

The Conclusion

The Smart Energy Web Portal is the platform for customer engagement. The Smart Energy Web Portal invents a new customer experience that transforms the way customers use and value electricity.