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Case study - Rentokil


Johannesburg, 02 Mar 2015

With close to 900 employees, Rentokil Initial South Africa has representation in all major business centres within South Africa. Divisions in South Africa include Rentokil Pest Control, Initial Workplace Hygiene and Ambius Interior Plants.

Pest control services include control and eradication of rodents, crawling, flying and biting insects, birds, termites and stored product insects. Rentokil has been protecting homes and businesses across South Africa from pests for over 45 years. Providing a proactive service, Rentokil teams regularly visit home and business premises (normally on a monthly basis) to ensure they remain pest free.

Fact sheet
Solution: ACTNET's Electronic Document Delivery
Industry: Pest control
Provider: ACTNET
User: Rentokil Initial

Initial Hygiene provides washroom and workplace hygiene solutions such as sanitary waste disposal, hand washing and drying solutions, air care, industrial kitchen deep cleaning, floor mats and IT hygiene services.

Ambius provides interior pots and plants, as well as rental wall art, silk flowers and greenwalls to enhance the interior space. Additional services include short-term pot and plant rentals for parties, functions and special events.

Business problem

Marlon Rodriques, IT Computer Operations, said: "Postage was becoming a serious factor due to the cost of delivering invoices and statements to our clients. Added to this was the cost of printing, compounded by the delays in receiving customer payments due to the time involved in postage. Delivery by the postal system is just unpredictable.

"Customers would not pay on time due to non-receipt of documents, which involved our credit controllers having to scan or fax copies of invoices that had already been posted - a duplication of costs.

"A solution needed to be found."

Solution

Rentokil Initial decided to use ACTNET's Electronic Document Delivery (EDD) service. Once Rentokil Initial's requirements had been finalised, the implementation followed soon after. Monthly batch runs of invoices and statements are e-mailed, followed by smaller ad-hoc invoice runs, sometimes on a daily basis.

"EDD is a comprehensive and affordable document delivery solution that allows us to send invoices, statements and other financial documents such as payslips, contracts or policies electronically."

EDD allows Rentokil Initial to include free marketing offers and newsletters, which enhances Rentokil's ability to keep its clients well informed of special offers, including cross-product advertising. Coupled with the ability to send out documents in multiple languages, Rentokil is able to carry out marketing campaigns at the same time as delivering its invoices and statements.

Rentokil Initial is currently updating its e-mail database to verify that client details are correct, along with contacting non-e-mail clients to encourage them to move to the e-mail option.

Results

* Forty percent direct saving on postage and printing fees. This amount is expected to increase as more of Rentokil Initial's clients move to e-mail-based invoicing.
* Assurance that clients are now receiving necessary documents within minutes of sending, not waiting for up to two weeks for a document that may not arrive at all.
* Saving on man-hours, looking up and sending copies of documents via fax. Using EDD, a copy invoice can now be e-mailed immediately.
* Rentokil Initial staff are now free to concentrate on its core business.
* A high percentage of clients have requested to move to the e-mail billing platform.

Client testimonial

Credit controllers: "As all e-mailed invoices and statements are stored on the EDD system, we can access any invoice or statement and e-mail it to a customer immediately. We still have some clients that wish to receive hard-copy invoices, but this is lessening as time progresses. With the current post office strike, we have converted many more customers to e-mail. The result is happy customers receiving their invoices and statements with the super-fast ACTNET service.

"Before EDD was implemented, we printed invoices/statements and posted via the post office. The mail-house had 48 hours to produce proofs, print the invoices/statements and deliver them to a third party for postage. From there we just hoped customers received their documents."

Rodriques said: "And then we had a call from Actnet.

"After the initial set-up and proof runs, the first month started with one division's invoices. The following month, invoices for all our divisions were sent out via e-mail. The statements followed and then the main marketing tools were added. We were invited to attach an advert or notice to our customer invoice or statement, which is now used to inform our clients of other services and specials that we may be running.

"The turnaround time was cut down to less than 24 hours, even on weekends; we upload our invoices/statements to the FTP-site, ACTNET would then e-mail proofs for approval. Once we have approved the invoice/statement proofs, the documents are released and customers receive their e-mails within two hours.

"The e-mailing partnership between ACTNET and Rentokil Initial has added value to our customers by ensuring they receive their invoices and statements on time.

"We are still in the process of converting all our customers to e-mail, which will enhance our postage and printing savings even more.

I need to mention the friendly staff at ACTNET: Phillip Jackson, Gary du Plooy, Vicki Fegen and Rolanda Young - they are all willing to assist us in the 11th hour if we want an urgent change."

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