One of the problems that the customers of public sector utilities in the country had always been facing is lack of responsiveness by the utility companies.
This was stated by State Bank of Pakistan Governor Dr Ishrat Husain while speaking at a signing ceremony of an agreement of Sui Southern Gas Company (SSGC) with a California-based SPL WorldGroup for providing state-of-the-art customer care and billing solution here on Wednesday.
Dr Ishrat appreciated the company's management, which has taken up this challenge to improve the quality of service, care and facilities to the customers by bringing in information technology-based solutions.
He lauded the SSGC for initiating this agreement and said that the general public was suffering due to indifferent attitude, lack of responsibility and inertia of public sector utility monopolies.
"I am happy that the company (SSGC) moved in this direction and it will become a model for other utility companies like Karachi Electric Supply Corporation (KESC), Karachi Water and Sewerage Board (KWSB) and Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL) to follow such footsteps," he added.
Dr Ishrat hoped that the utility companies would also use other multiple channels for payment of their bills to end long queues and remove inconvenience for their customers.
This is an issue the SBP was grappling for quite some time and hoped that the SPL WorldGroup with its modern technology would also be useful for other companies to resolve billing and collection problems.
Earlier, SPL Chief Executive Officer Harry Debes said that the company has 70 clients world-wide, including leading customers in the United States for its proven customer care and billing solution technology called 'CorDaptix'.
This involves meter reading, billing, collection and rating for utilities and tax collection for internal revenue generation agencies, he said, adding that the SPL client has a clientele base in the United States, Latin America, Europe, Africa, Asia and Australia.
Provincial Information Technology Minister Mustafa Kamal appreciated the efforts of gas utility (SSGC) for further improving its billing system and said it would benefit common man.
The government acts as a facilitator in the promotion of IT sector in the country and would provide every possible support to the private sector that drives the technology in and outside the country, he added.
SSGC Managing Director Munawar Baseer Ahmed said it was a landmark achievement of the company which was striving hard to become the most IT-enable entity in the country.
He said, earlier, the company has signed a contract with IBM Pakistan for bills and out source its entire billing.
In addition, the company was undertaking development project to expand its gas supply and provide gas connections to 600 new towns in the country.
In a detailed presentation, SSGC's Information Technology General Manager Zuhair Siddiqui said that the Customer Information System (CIS) solution will embed industry best practices that covers pre-sales, sales, billing, customer services, field services, metering and many other customer-centric processes.
He said that about 1.7 million customers would be serviced through this investment.
The company has been able to contract, through an open international tender process, the best economical and workable price.
The SSGC-SPL strategic partnership will also set up a centre of excellence and software and applications development centre for CIS in Pakistan at SSGC.
Later, SSGC Managing Director Munawar Baseer Ahmed and SPL WorldGroup CEO Harry Debes signed the agreement in the presence of Dr Ishrat Husain, Mustafa Kamal, Consul General of United States Douglas C. Rohn and SSGC Chairman Aitezaz Shahbaz.
Comments
Comments are closed.