Energy efficiency services provider, Iskhus Power, headquartered in Gauteng, with regional offices in the Western Cape, Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal, has fine-tuned its focus on customers through the implementation of a Sage Accpac CRM software solution.
Customer services and support manager Victor Mathey said the initial path adopted by the company to improve customer relationship management was founded on spreadsheet software, as that was where the basic customer information lay.
“Our workflow is lineal and to keep track of these details in a spreadsheet became the stuff of nightmares, so we turned our attention to other ways of doing this. We came into contact with Lorge and were introduced to the Sage Accpac CRM solution.”
September became “CRM month” within Iskhus Power, and the solution implemented by Lorge became fully operational on 1 September. The CRM software is presently being run standalone, but Iskhus Power intends implementing the full Sage Accpac ERP 100 accounting and financial software solution in due course.
“Our priority was to attend to the customer relationship needs as the greater need, and now that our customer base management system is in place, we will be paying attention to the remainder of the financial software solution,” said Mathey.
The Sage Accpac CRM solution provides automated scheduling as well as reminders of tasks and actions still to be completed. It also schedules customer audits and power conditioning equipment maintenance requirements.
“The major benefit is that it very smoothly drives each customer right through the whole process,” says Mathey. “Service calls are logged and escalated as necessary, and with the CRM system sitting between the sales and the service departments, everyone is kept in the loop and informed of progress.
“We've had significant improvement in customer services feedback since implementing the CRM solution,” said Mathey. “Now all customer visits are tracked and entered. The entry will not be closed until it is confirmed that feedback has been received by the customer. This feedback is also important to our engineers, and is readily available from the CRM system.”
Softline Accpac Sales Director Keith Fenner said the Iskhus Power implementation of the Sage Accpac CRM solution demonstrated the value that can be unlocked by appropriate CRM software functionality, providing the right information at the right time.
“Continuously meeting customer expectations is critical to survival in today's highly competitive and global business environment,” said Fenner. “Companies providing products, solutions and services need rapid access to accurate, meaningful customer information and status to ensure they keep the business.”
The core of Iskhus Power's services is to provide companies with long-term sustainability in terms of their energy efficiency requirements. This is achieved by improving low voltage electricity network power quality, reducing losses resulting from poor power quality, improving equipment performance and extending its lifespan, increasing profit and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
The PowerFix technology has realised savings of between 6% and 34%.
Other improvements and savings can be achieved by retrofitting inefficient electrical equipment with newer, more efficient equipment, which results in savings potential of between 2% and 22%.
In addition to the above interventions, a load management programme can be implemented, which contributes to savings by switching off non-essential loads and reducing energy consumption during peak periods.
Iskhus Power has been active in the energy efficiency industry since 1998 and has conducted numerous audits and projects with more than 700 PowerFix installations in South Africa, Botswana and Namibia.
This is a lot of information to keep track of, but the CRM solution provides an ideal repository.
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