Johannesburg, 20 Jun 2002
Telkom Directory Services (TDS) has achieved an excellent return on investment from its deployment of Ascential DataStage, the market`s best selling enterprise data integration tool.
In the two years since it first implemented DataStage at a cost of around R1 million, TDS has been able to reduce the human intervention substantially at its data verification centre, to speed up and boost the accuracy of the data verification process, and to lay a foundation for ongoing change.
TDS, SA`s leading provider of directional information, is a partly owned subsidiary of Telkom and is the country`s largest publisher of telephone directories. It produces the Yellow Pages, carrying the details of more than 400 000 businesses and advertisers, and the White-Page directories nationwide, which carry more than 4 million residential entries. These entries are readily accessible via a directory, the telephone (10-11-8) or the Internet (www.yellowpages.co.za).
A core source of TDS`s data is the daily feed it obtains from Telkom`s Oracle-based Customer Billing System. This is sent through to TDS electronically. The data is transformed for loading onto both TDS`s own Oracle database and its call centre application. This process ensures certain fields are assigned specific values to fit the requirements of TDS`s listing format. TDS receives an average of more than 80 000 service requests from Telkom each week. Most are processed automatically, while those in the call centre are submitted to a process of verification and augmentation.
"We went to tender two years ago," says Hanlie Stander, system interface consultant at TDS. "After reviewing all the key offerings on the market, we chose to go with DataStage, and it has been an easy decision to cost-justify."
A major benefit has been a reduction in the intuitive human intervention required to verify subscriber data, compared to when the data was coded manually. With the implementation of DataStage, TDS was able to reduce the human intervention process by 40%.
"Automating the process also increases the data accuracy without manual intervention," adds Stander.
TDS is moving to new core applications, and will also use DataStage for full scrub mapping and the conversion of existing application data to the new system.
"Forward-looking companies are according data quality and integrity the attention they deserve," says Julian Field, GM of Ascential Software South Africa. "The result, as Telkom Directory Services has shown, is always better business and customer service and greater flexibility in technology choices."
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