Customer service is an increasingly vital asset for payment providers to drive top and bottom-line performance and to improve the overall experience of their customers. The use of advanced payment analytics to transform the customer satisfaction experience has been implemented in a number of ways by the great majority of credit card companies, banks and other providers, but there has still not been a complete leveraging of this ability to that end.
In order for the analytical capabilities that are available in today’s world to have their potential fully realised, financial institutions will have to acquire, develop or already be in possession of the appropriate capabilities and make use of them in order to have a wide array of customer interactions enhanced and customised.
The adoption of advanced payment analytics for the development of broader integrated approaches by payment providers results in significant improvements in customer satisfaction scores. The use of analytics can also make major reductions to operational costs by removing leakage across channels and seeing a greater number of customer interactions migrating to self-service channels.
Payment analytics have also seen an improvement in customer revenues and retention for businesses by making improvements to cross-selling and enhancing the overall customer journey.
Customer service in the future
There has been a dramatic shift in the nature of customer service in recent years, with models that previously focused on branches and phones changing to other service channels such as online, chat and mobile interactions.
High-quality service is expected across all channels by payments customers, and in order to ensure this level of service can be delivered, payment companies have to make the most of telecommunications with both customers and potential prospects and make certain that they are capable of delivering seamless multi-channel interactions.
Mobile payment options
As much as 60% of customers reported greater satisfaction when they are able to use their mobile devices to make payments, according to a survey from Fiserv. Companies which are able to increase the number of customers that make payments via mobile devices will experience a reduction in billing costs due to the shorter processing time and smaller manpower requirement. Because the customer also needs to make less of an effort to pay, a rise in customer satisfaction is also likely.
As a part of this process, payment analytics can be used to work out which customers are not paying via this channel despite having mobile devices, and then reach out to them to find out why and talk through any concerns they may have.
Emergencies
Many people forget to pay bills until close to the deadline at one time or another, and increasing the number of options for such emergency payments is another good way in which companies can increase customer satisfaction while also reducing collection and disconnections costs. Payment analytics can help work out whether increasing customer education on existing plans or creating extra billing options would be the best way to serve customers with a history of late or last-minute payments.
The correct use of payment analytics can transform customer service within any business, in any industry.
