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Frens Jan Rumph
Profile: I am a researcher, technical consultant and software engineer based in Holland. I have specialized in Charging, Accounting and Billing architectures. From both a technical point of view (IETF, 3GPP, etc) and a business point of view (TM Forum, GBA).
Main interests: Telecom, Charging, Accounting, Billing, Service Orientation, Software Architectures, Software Engineering
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Global Billing, Customer Experience and Revenue Management Initiative
It’s becoming a bit tumultuous in the group previously known as the Global Billing Association. After naming themselves the Billing and Customer Experience Initiative after teaming up with the TM Forum, they have now changed their name into the Revenue Management Initiative.
Although their actions (and probably their vast personal and professional network) define their right of existence, I’m not sure about their new name. I can understand the move to drop the name GBA, although it still is a very strong brand name in my perception, billing on itself is probably setting the scope to narrow. Also the integration within the TM Forum calls for a different name. And while the Billing and Customer Experience Initiative doesn’t really sound that catchy it does align with my perception of the challenges and opportunities in charging and billing.
The bill is traditionally an important part in the communication towards the customer. Yet we still only send a bill once a month and then leave it at that, while one can easily image that service usage and perceived service value can be increased by more direct feedback in relation to the service and the billing relationship. As an example: lack of transparency in the tariff function can unnecessarily be a prohibitive factor in using a service, especially if the service is complex or consumed abroad. But also customer usually will be quite happy to see when he or she can consume or just has consumed a service with a discount or even for free, this is completely different effect then when you see the aggregated discount at the bill at the end of the month!
So for me, charging, billing and settlement is about more then just the monetisation of a service, the usage to cash process. And the term revenue is an operator focused term, and focussing on the operator instead of the customer is not going to keep us in the game when competing with the internet domain…
Al together I hope they (or we actually, due the participation through my employer) can increase the quality of the billing stack in the Enhanced Telecom Operations Map!
Billing and Customer Experience – A New Initiative
The Global Billing Association (GBA, www.globalbilling.org) has been dissolved and the Billing and Customer Experience Initiative has been founded in its stead.
This means on one hand that the knowledge of the group is accessible from all TM Forum members. And on the other hand that all TM Forum members can add their experience and knowledge to the group. I do hope that the group will still be pushing the state of the art or at least bringing the state of the art from the research plane down to the business plane. Be it through updated versions of the GBA Map (or should I say BCEI Map) or through enhancements and modernisation of the TM Forum’s eTOM.
Link: The announcement by Alex Leslie
Frens Jan Rumph