A no-brainer

The very real cost-savings associated with moving from paper-based to electronic billing have seen everyone from banks to mobile operators making the move in recent years. From knowing that the bill has actually been delivered, to being able to provide a more efficient service to customers, the benefits of e-billing are straightforward, and easily realised.

Pay-channel television broadcaster MultiChoice started its initiative approximately three years ago. "E-billing is more effective, more efficient, and cost-wise, it results in a substantial saving," says Roberta Bonato, MultiChoice communications manager for operations support.

"It also gives us the ability to track an invoice. We know whether it has been sent, is undelivered or if it bounced. With the Post Office, you don`t know if the customer has received it or not.

"There`s also the speed element. We can get invoices to the customer far more quickly, which gives them the ability to budget correctly and maybe pay earlier," she says.

Absa`s digital channel head Christo Vrey says the cost-saving component definitely plays a part in the bank`s move to present statements electronically. "Cost saving is every biller`s primary drive," he states. "The second driver talks about the convenience and immediacy part of it. At the end of a billing run, we can send statements to customers the minute the run is complete. It is immediate and sends the customer a bill far faster than the normal structure would."

The third driver for Absa is the opportunities that e-billing gives it to bring in other value-adds, says Vrey. "Now that bills are delivered real-time, we can engage the customer via the statement, include special offers, dynamically add personalised content, and give the customer a much broader exposure to Absa`s product set than they would have with a static statement."

The fourth angle for Absa is the ability to reflect the statement within its Internet banking system, tying the loop between presentment and payment (see The missing link).

"There have been a number of initiatives in the industry trying to establish this, the latest of which is being driven by Bankserv," Vrey says. "It is something the industry really needs."

In the absence of that, Absa believes that current models will evolve to a point where independent billers present bills to customers online and tie innovative payment vehicles to the bills. That said, Vrey believes it is critical for the final link to be put in place so that the industry can take a step forward.

Both MultiChoice and Absa rely on e-billing company Striata for their e-billing solutions. In MultiChoice`s case, the broadcaster has opted for an ASP model. It sends daily billing files (automatically generated by its billing system) to Striata, which imports it into a statement template. The statements are then encrypted in accordance with SARS regulations, and the e-mails sent out.

Cost saving is every biller`s primary drive.

Christo Vrey, digital channel head, Absa

Says Striata CEO Mike Wright: "MultiChoice has roughly two million customers, of which three quarters don`t receive statements because they are either annual customers, paid-up customers, or on debit order. So it only sends monthly statements to about 482 000 customers, of which about 230 000 receive statements electronically."

This is significant, he says, because by international norms, it is common to only have converted around 19% of a customer base to e-billing over a three- or four-year period.

Absa handles its e-billing internally. Striata supplies the software and supports it as required.

Either way, both Absa and MultiChoice say they have seen significant cost savings from the move, noting that sending an e-bill costs about a quarter of what a paper bill does. The math is pretty simple, like the transition to e-billing itself.