Challenge
As a result of recent acquisitions, our client, a large U.S.-based international long distance service provider, began initiatives to target inter-company business services, revenue assurance for customer billing, and internal process and system improvements. Other considerations leading to this decision included: 1) the growth of independent billing and receivable architectures, and 2) an increase in interdependent processes supporting complex business service offerings.
The scope of each initiative requires a thorough understanding of the telecommunications industry, coordination across functional areas and business units, subject matter expertise in revenue assurance management and process improvement, and the ability to identify quantifiable benefits and results in a short time frame. Based on TMNG Global’s proven expertise in helping clients undertake process and system improvements, we were commissioned for project engagement.
TMNG Global Solution
The first of three projects managed by TMNG Global supported the client’s Local Service at a large regional U.S. Operations Center. Our team was originally retained to conduct an audit of the access line count process and to implement enhancements to ensure greater accuracy. Through this initiative, we built an automated process to extract, interpret, and match information from various systems to determine root cause. Our team also provided recommendations for reviewing and correcting provisioning and billing processes.
Additionally, we started corrective action via a short-term revenue recovery project. Currently, TMNG is supporting the continuation of the Revenue Recovery Project and managing the implementation of tools and procedures to eliminate root causes of line and usage errors and discrepancies. The switch audit team identified major discrepancies between circuits provisioned in switches and charges billed to customers, analyzed current manual and automated processes to identify root causes for circuit provisioning and billing errors, and recommended corrective actions.
During a concurrent project, we partnered with the internal staff members of the Revenue Assurance Management team for Business Services. Emphasis was placed on cash management related to lock box placement, receipts collection and processing, dispute resolution through early recognition, and the reconciliation of unapplied cash. Our subject matter experts (SMEs) developed the analysis and documentation for each area, created process and system flow charts, and presented recommendations and the quantification of benefits in less than nine weeks.
Most recently, our team was engaged to provide an objective assessment of the processes and systems currently used to identify accounts as internal versus external, wholesale or resale. In addition, we were tasked with identifying immediate quick wins as well as strategic solutions aimed at reducing the gross accounts receivable, receivable reserves, and the recapture of previously remitted tax payments. The initial efforts of the project team focused on data gathering, documentation, and discovery interviews. Simultaneously,, the magnitude of the problem and opportunity for quick wins were being assessed. It is also expected that operational efficiencies will be identified and additional cost savings will be realized as a result of the engagement.
TMNG Global audited Service Delivery Center order-to-bill processes. We also documented recommendations to eliminate bottlenecks to order completion and provisioning/billing of out-of-synch situations which could lead to unbillable CDRs. Our team analyzed 12 to 20 million unbillable CDRs per month and determined that approximately 50 percent were records for access mediation (CABS billing) instead of unbillable CDRs. Our SMEs updated error correction reported to eliminate these from the research process. Additionally, we provided separate reporting for the record, to be used by the CABS billing process.
For each project, we contributed in multiple areas:
- providing project management
- preparing detailed analysis
- writing business requirements
- creating process flow diagrams, user acceptance testing, process development, and design systems
- managing the critical hand-off and transition of responsibilities to internal departments and staff.
Benefits to the Client
The client funded this project through the recovery of revenue, improved cash flow, and the reduction of operating costs that we generated. Each project that was implemented had a quantifiable benefit which included the recovery of $20 million in billed revenue for the client’s Local Service program, an opportunity to increase cash flow through the refinement of the lock box process for approximately $100 million in daily cash receipts, and the reduction of accounts receivable.
Our SMEs identified root causes for 12 million unbillable calls per month and implemented corrective actions to provisioning, billing, and error correction processes. The client projected a potential recovery over $17 million from its accounts receivable in benefits and cost savings.