Next month, we are launching an improved the fibre intact connection process. The improved process will provide a better experience for end-customers and less calls to your support teams seeking assistance.

In July, we  told you about our plan to run a fibre intact support trial on ~2,000 intact fibre orders in July / August. The trial was designed to:

• support fibre intact customers who we believed had an ‘at risk’ ONT status (i.e. grey or black status indicating there is a potential power related issue) and whose install was likely to fail.
• reduce end-user calls to RSPs for assistance for those failed installs; and
• reduce potential delays in getting a working fibre service for this category of customer.

The trial has been completed and was a success, as some of the key results below show:

• Strong level of self-service uptake: we contacted 1,987 end-customers via SMS with an ‘at risk’ ONT status during the trial. 69% of these end-customers accessed the Chorus website using the link provided in our SMS.
• Increase in CX: intact support provided to end-customers involved in the trial contributed to a customer experience (CX) score of 8.4, compared to 7.4 during the same month for end-customers not involved in the trial.  This exceeded our expectations; with scores improving across communications, timing and fibre performance.
• Reduced RSP and end-customer effort: 277 end-customers involved in the trial ordered an ONT power cable directly from the Chorus website rather than contacting their RSP for assistance.

What’s happening

October launch – ‘Grey’ and ‘Black’ status ONTs

Based on the success of the trial, we intend to launch the intact support process on a BAU basis from 19 October 2020. This will apply to all connect primary (intact fibre) orders where the ONT status is ‘grey’ or ‘black’ at the time of the order. If the ONT status is grey or black indicating there is a potential power related issue, an SMS will be sent to the end-customer within an hour after Chorus receives the order from an RSP.

The SMS will direct the end-customer to a fibre intact page with information on how they can repower their ONT and, if necessary, order a new power cable: https://www.chorus.co.nz/connect

Second trial – ‘Green’ status ONTs

The trial results indicate there is a further opportunity to help customers whose ONT status changes to ‘at risk’ during the order process (i.e. from ‘green’/good).  One reason this change may occur is as a result of a previous occupant moving out and taking the power pack with them or turning the ONT off.

The trial results, and other research we’ve done in this space, suggest end-customers have a better experience and more confidence in the connection process when we pro-actively provide them with relevant information.

We want to trial a broader application of the intact support process. The idea is to trial this process for all consumer connect primary orders over a two-week period between 19-30 October. We want to see if an intact support really does result in a better customer experience for all intact orders irrelevant of their ONT status at the time an order is placed. The process and comms adopted for the launch and the measures of success from the first trial would remain the same for this broader trial. We’ll report back to you the results of this broader trial once it is completed, with a view to this approach being adopted on a BAU basis if the broader trial is successful also.

Future state

Earlier in September, we ran co-design workshops with some of you to map out the future state fibre intact experience. This included discussion on how the ONT status could be utilised in order to drive the best customer experience. It was clear that the ideal experience is for this status to be provided directly to you to allow them to deliver your own communications to end-customers.

We view the October launch for Intact Support for 'grey’ and ‘black’ status ONTs and any potential launch of the broader approach as interim measures. These measures will improve customer experience until such time as we have developed the capability to provide ONT status information directly to you at the time of order for them to manage these communications yourselves directly with end customers.

What’s the details

We first communicated this trial at the June Product Forum and followed that up with an update.

We reported the trial results at the September Product Forum. Customer specific results are available via your Account team.

Next steps & contact

We've created an Intact Support dedicated page in which we'll be updating all the information regarding this project, check it out.