Enersource made a business decision to reduce costs and increase efficiencies though consolidation, relocation and outsourcing parts of its call centre operations. Essential to this was to provide access to Enersource account and billing application to the call center, while minimizing deployment, management, infrastructure and support costs. The chosen architecture required a centralized, three tier e-business which avoided any duplication of existing operations centers, and provided browser/web-based access  to existing applications, tailored to the needs of the call center.

The application in question is used by Customer Service Representatives who assist clients with billing inquiries, account changes, and service support. In the past, the call center used a proprietary screen scraper GUI interface, which required a per-seat licensed client software loaded on the PC (fat PC client). This fat client restricted the application to internal users only. The new solution not only extended the application reach through the Internet, it also eliminated any licensing costs for the users, as well as any specific client requirements, outside of a browser. The web browser interface did not require any client code to be installed on the users PC - just Internet Explorer. This eliminated virtually all client support costs, yet provided secure access to the application. The access provided via the public Internet versus using costly leased lines permitted additional, substantial savings.

 After looking at several options for web enabling their application, IBM’s WebFacing was chosen by Enersource because of its ability to be customized exactly to corporate interface and web standards. Included in these standards was a  productivity enhancement which allowed the users to jump amongst many screens within an application module using a tab based navigation system. The solution is also extensible, for instance, to interface with external applications for electronic bill presentment and for sending letters to clients. This demonstrates WebFacing flexibility and ability to integrate with other complex web features.

WebFacing had a big benefit to Enersource in that it avoided any per-user licensing costs. This allows the customer to grow easily while lowering all costs.  The tools needed were readily available and most customers already have them.  All that is required is WebSphere Studio (which most customers have as part of their software subscription), and WebSphere Express (which has low cost pricing and comes included with many new iSeries models).  This made the project easier to complete as all the technology was already included with the iSeries and all Enersource  needed was expertise to convert the application and customize the interfaces.

ASTECH Solutions Inc, of Aurora, was chosen as the implementation partner for this project. After a keyword assessment was performed, the project was sized as a fixed-price project. The project plan had the Beta available for September 2003, with deployment plans for  October 2003.  In December 17 of 2003, it went into full production. It is now successfully deployed, with the customer realizing a fast return on investment. Rod Lee, IT Manager of Enersource says:

"IBM has provided us with the technology and via Business Partners like ASTECH Solutions, the knowledge to significantly change how we deliver applications to our end users.

Using WebSphere Application Server Express and the WebFacing Tool we were able to convert our customer service applications to run in web browsers. This allowed us to quickly and cost effectively  re-locate the call center to a remote location. We were very pleased at how IBM and ASTECH were able to provide a complete solution that gives us deployment flexibility and the ability to react to new opportunities now and in the future.

We think that spending valuable resources on administering desktop PC software just doesn’t make sense, using our resources to deliver high quality customer service – now that makes sense!”

 The application runs on an iSeries Model i810 with WebSphere Application Server V5 Express and was developed with WebSphere Development Studio for iSeries V5.

Mark Buchner, president of ASTECH Solutions says:

“Once the customer sees the business  benefits of the web-faced solution – the decision to proceed with a project becomes easy. The benefits include:  improving customer service, reducing customer service costs,  lowering infrastructure costs, reducing software licensing costs and reducing  support costs. Webfacing provides a huge advantage in that there are no client licenses, the Application Server requirements can be taken care of with WAS Express, WebFacing eliminates the need for the Enterprise feature on new iSeries models, the results are fast and predictable, and WebFacing can be tailored to the user need”

ASTECH is providing full project support, including scoping, sizing, design, configuration, application conversion, customization, implementation, tuning, and customer support.