Distributive Printing

Speeding Up the Delivery of National and Regional CLEC Invoices

Print mail remains the most vital link for regional and national carriers with their customers. Maximizing the efficiency and effectiveness of invoices through the newest technological advances in production and mailing can reduce costs and keep the all-important bond with customers strong.

The critical need for both speed and accuracy in dispatching mission-critical documents is obvious. And, it's no longer enough for an invoice to be a readable statement of accounts; it must be strategically crafted and deployed as a marketing and customer care tool. Additionally, a well-presented invoice can greatly enhance and reinforce a CLEC's image; poor presentations, on the other hand, can be a big customer turn-off.

In such a constantly changing and demanding industry, how can expanding CLECs best meet exacting communications requirements? A multistep approach is necessary. Managers must clearly define current customer needs and expectations while anticipating future communications needs. A fiscally sound strategy should be structured to meet present needs while laying the groundwork for the future.

Improving Speed of Delivery

Meeting customer care needs via billing is just as imperative as every other aspect of telecommunications service. In most consumers' minds, faster equates with better. Distributive printing, one of the latest advancements in business mailing strategies, provides an alternative to CLECs' seeking rapid delivery at a cost much less than overnight or other expedited services.

In its simplest terms, distributive printing allows regional or national carriers to print and mail communications from multiple locations across the country. Instead of introducing invoices into the U.S. Postal Service system from one centralized location, distributive printing jettisons business communications into the mail stream at strategically advantageous points, offering the fastest delivery to the end recipient and cutting delivery time by as much as 75 percent.

Both national and regional companies doing business across a wide geographical range benefit most from distributive print-mail. Assuming that 40 percent to 65 percent of consumers regularly pay their bills upon receipt, faster delivery represents a significant potential for much-needed infusion of capital.

Invoices With Impact

Making the most of billing communications is especially important for CLECs, for which the monthly invoice may be their only means of touching base with their customers. Research shows that it is four times more expensive to replace a customer than to keep him. An essential way to keep a customer happy is through customer care-oriented communications.

Flawless messages, personalized to the individual recipient and tailored to the CLEC's footprint with pertinent local or regional carrier information and ratings, can help keep customer satisfaction high. Confusing and inaccurate invoices are especially unacceptable to wireless telco customers; variable amount transactions require precisely engineered and well-organized formats.

By providing subscribers accurate, timely and user-friendly account records, a CLEC can drastically reduce the number of calls to its service centers. The ability to provide this is a critical advantage in an industry in which branding and market share go hand-in-hand. Positive consumer response to well-crafted invoices mailed in a prompt, reliable fashion not only can play a constructive role in customer retention and satisfaction, but also can provide valuable feedback and information for management and marketing.

Sophisticated distributive print mail systems can provide cost effective strategies for meeting current communication needs. Distributive print mail is achieved by telcos' electronically transmitting relevant billing data and information to a central processing office. There, data and information are married with the appropriate forms stored in a digital library and electronically distributed to the appropriate print-mail site. Data from multiple sources (i.e., discrete convergence products and services) can be consolidated into a single, cohesive and unified communication. Additionally, if several documents are addressed to a single recipient, they can be "householded"--combined and mailed in a single envelope. Both of these techniques eliminate waste and duplication of effort, and they keep postal costs to a minimum.

Critical to the distributive process is the role of each customer's mailing address. Individual customer addresses are verified during processing. Communications are then sorted by ZIP Code, grouped and electronically distributed to print-mail locations that have demonstrated the fastest delivery to that ZIP Code.

To ensure expedited bill delivery, distributive networks should undergo periodic "seeding" by sending out test mailings to a broad and representative range of mailing addresses from each print-mail location and calculating the actual mail delivery times. With mail delivery, proximity is not always the key; the Postal Service has idiosyncrasies that can accelerate or delay delivery time. Consequently, managing communications' optimal distribution is a must.

Distributive print mail can deliver invoices into the hands of customers more quickly than centrally dispatched first class mailings. Typically, 90 percent of distributive mail is dispatched in one or two days, where centrally distributed mail may take five or six days. In maximizing cash flow, speeding up the customer payment process is certainly an underutilized technique.

According to a survey and analysis in the June 1997 issue of CFO Magazine, telcos could stand to improve their collections. Current cycles for days of working capital, as well as payables and sales outstanding, are high among other industry averages--45, 49 and 69 days respectively. Through distributive print mail, CLECs can tighten their financial reigns and become more fluid.

Outsourcing: A Solution

Outsourcing--the printing and mailing of billing communications through sophisticated distributive print mail systems--is an especially attractive alternative to national or regional CLECs burdened with outmoded legacy systems. Often these companies are less than eager to allocate the time and resources needed to enhance or restructure their in-house capabilities. New start-ups also can benefit from reduced time-to-market by working with experienced professionals. In either case, outsourcing allows companies to concentrate on establishing footprints, advancing core competencies, caring for customers and creating market share.

The technology needed to produce efficient, state-of-the-art communications is complex, expensive and subject to rapid changes and obsolescence. Keeping that technology functioning at peak levels requires a long-term commitment to regular systems upgrades, a highly trained and skilled staff and a variety of other fixed and variable overhead costs.

In today's print mail arena, achieving heightened efficiencies requires not only that CLECs make best use of high-tech equipment, they also must keep up with the many requirements of the Postal Service for first class business communications. While presorting and adhering to the latest mailing standards are crucial, they are not enough. Optimizing mail pieces by weight also is important, requiring sophisticated hardware and software to process individual communications at both the printing and letter shop stages.

Power Billing for Tomorrow

Invoicing systems set in place today should anticipate the increased complexity of the CLEC marketplace. Given the ongoing dynamics of the industry--deregulation, intensified market competition, and the significant advances in both transmission and access technologies--CLECs should be flexible when creating or upgrading billing systems or when allying with a billing service provider.

Open billing systems allow the complex rating and discounting of converging services, which quickly are becoming the norm. It is only a matter of time before customers will want to receive their invoices via their phone, the Internet, on CD-ROM and other media in addition to paper, further complicating the delivery process.

Bruce Garfield is vice president and general manager for Denver-based Output Technologies, a provider of business communications in the mutual fund, insurance and financial services industries. For more information, contact Kathi Naughton at (800) 252-4541.

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