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Safaricom Sustainability Report 2016
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How did we deliver value to them during the year?
Consumers
The new strategy has plugged the customer back into the business in a meaningful way. Central to this has been our
commitment to daily calls between the CEO, Technology Directors and the Customer Care teams to discuss and resolve the
most pressing customer issues and we are already reaping the benefits of this approach. As a result of initiatives conceived
during these conversations, we have seen calls to our contact centre drop from highs of around 600,000 to around 400,000
per day during the year.
This 30% reduction in calls has been achieved through a variety of initiatives, including empowering our frontline staff
to achieve First Call Resolution (FCR) by giving them the tools and authority to deal with more customer issues without
escalating these; ensuring better coordination with technical teams to support system stability and quick turnaround times
in cases of failure; and our regionalisation programme, which has regional teams monitoring and resolving local issues,
increasing our focus and shortening turnaround times. Other notable initiatives from the year include:
•
The
Hakikisha
service
This service provides M-PESA users with peace of mind by asking them to verify the receiving party before sending
funds. This service has reduced payment reversals — the single biggest reason for a calls to the contact centre – by
15% since its introduction. The service still has some flaws, however, since it does not work on all devices and some
customers get confused because the default cancel key on the phone screen doesn’t actually stop the transaction.
•
Expanding customer self-service channels
The capacity of our Social Media online query service was expanded during the year to handle more queries and
more licences were added for more agents to be able to work concurrently, which has dropped average response
times to social media queries from 1.5 hours to under 30 minutes. Our USSD self-service was also enhanced to enable
customers to obtain PUK, account and products and services information. We did not launch the social media self-
service app as intended during the year, but plan to do so during FY17.
•
Improving customer care with dedicated desks
We opened 54 ‘care desks’ at dealer premises across the country, offering on-site expertise and customer care
services.
•
My Safaricom
App
To further improve customer service, we launched the easy-to-use My Safaricom App. The application empowers
users with self-care features that allow subscribers to resolve most of their issues on their own. The App also features the
following services: airtime top ups; M-PESA statement requests; options to view, redeem and transfer Bonga points; data
and SMS bundle purchasing; talk to a customer care agent through Live Chat or Facebook; and the management of
SMS services.
Enterprise customers
A few of the specific ways in which we have delivered value to our enterprise customers during the year include:
•
Partner Engagement Programme (PEP)
Launched in FY14, our Partner Engagement Programme (PEP) is an intensive training initiative designed to ensure
that every partner interaction with customers is of the very highest standards of professionalism. It is a comprehensive
programme that consists of four subject areas or pillars and we successfully trained 550 partners and staff on these four
pillars during the year.
•
Project Delight
Our ‘Project Delight’ initiative recognises that our customers are more than transactions and reminds us that, no matter
how successful and big we become, we must remain focused on the individual relationships that are at the heart of our
success. Through the project, we organise a series of networking and social events for enterprise customers throughout
the year and, fundamentally, it reminds us that we are a group of people achieving things together. We successfully
executed several campaigns and events this year, including VIP experiences at the Safaricom 7s and Safaricom Jazz
Festival, celebrating Mother’s Day and Father’s Day, hosting guests at the Rhino Charge 2015 event and through
participating in various Safaricom@15 initiatives.