Push Button Paradise

SBC, my phone company, apparently has terrible internal BPM (Business Process Management). They have multiple systems that contain redundant data. How can I tell?

Well, for one, when you call in, you need to enter (or speak) the phone number you're calling about. Once you finally get through to a human voice, they ask you for the exact same information. While it's never good to annoy customers, this isn't a huge issue.

Still, I don't have the DSL modem they promised to ship me. This is a problem. I had no problems getting an initial bill, but the UPS package is missing. Calling in to support, UPS returned the shipment because they didn't have an apartment number. Yet on my desk, I have two letters from SBC that do have the full address, apartment number and all.

At some point, the same information must need to be entered into at least two different systems, and without any cross-consistency checks. Maybe this would be a better case for BPI (Business Process Integration), but in any case, it's an example of how process can affect customer satisfaction and the bottom line.

-m

P. S. I'm not going to have time to work on bpmfocus.com. I'm thinking of putting the site/domain up on the block. Anyone interested?

posted at: 23:04 | under: 2005-09 | 0 comment(s)