1. Communicating with Key Accounts During Outages and Power Quality Events
Slide #2
Kim Weaver
Rocky Mount Public Utilities
APPA 2005 Customer Connections Conference
Kansas City, Missouri
October 25, 2005

2. Proactive vs. Reactive Relationships
Objective #1
Proactive
vs.
Reactive
Relationships
Slide #2
ABSOLUTE MUST for all KA customer
Whether good news or bad news—customers should hear it from you FIRST (not the newspaper or the rumor mill)
Crisis situation such as an outage or power quality event is not the time to establish a relationship but improve on the relationship...build on the trust already established through proactive measures

3. Establish Trusting Relationships
Objective #2
Establish Trusting Relationships
Trusting relationships with KA customers means knowing your customers and what they need from you
#1 need for ALL customers: The TRUTH
How many of you have an established KA program?
Do you know who to contact the facility?
How often do you contact? How? What do you know about them?
#1 Goal: Establish a relationship where the customer becomes assured you are in their corner and have their interests in mind

4. Power Outages
Planned Outages – Coordinate Ahead with Key Account customers to work during down time if possible
Storms – contact customers prior to storms to give contact information
Unavoidable Outages – contact customers to explain outage and approximate repair time
During your routine relationship building interaction with customers, identify any special technical, equipment or support roles a customer could play in an emergency—for future activation during an emergency…gives customer a sense of empowerment (people want to help during major emergencies).
During a major storm I am usually in a different location. In order for my customers to know how to reach me I call ahead of time to let them know where I will be and a phone number to contact. This lets the customer know their production time is important to us, and we want them to have an inside line of communication with us.
Helps to build the existing relationship and gives a sense of security that all they have to do is pick up the phone and can find out what is happening…gives customer a sense of being an “insider”
We certainly don’t want to release information that could be sensitive, but it is important to provide up to the minute information to these customers that are so important to our system
Unavoidable Outages – animals such as squirrels, car accidents, limbs falling and sometimes even an equipment problem can’t be avoided
We have a spreadsheet of all our KA customers and their electric circuit
I have a pager that notifies me of a circuit that is down
I immediately call our SCADA operator to get information on the problem and possible down time
I then call every KA customer on that circuit to let them know what the problem is and how long we expect the power to be out and if we will be able to change them to another circuit to get them back up and running immediately
Sometimes they are actually back up before I can finish phone calls because our SCADA operator has switched them to a different circuit
Example of an instance such as this

5. Power Quality Events
I don’t need to tell you what a power quality event is and that we all continuously strive to provide the most reliable and consistent power available, but in the real world we know things can happen
Goal: Your relationship-building efforts positions your service delivery at such a high level that your customer realizes the event is unavoidable – and not a result of incompetence or neglect.

6. Causes Faulty equipment inside or outside the facility
Storms (Ice and Lightning)
Animals
Start up of Large Loads at Neighboring Facilities
Respond to your customer immediately! Never try to downplay that a power quality event is no big deal….it’s costing your customer money!
When your customer calls you and tells you they are having blinks or power surges…they want immediate attention.
It is imperative to find out what is happening to them….dispatch troubleshooters to go to their site and look for the problem if it is on their line
We will already know if it is our problem through our SCADA system
ALL customer contact and on-site service staff should pay attention to the warning signs and report – they don’t go away if we close our eyes.

7. Proactive vs. Reactive
Providing infrared scanning to Key Account customers
Aggressive Tree Trimming Program
Contact with Customers if there is a known problem
Switching customers to an alternate circuit
SCADA (Supervisory Control & Data Acquisition)
Workshops
Energy Audits
As we all know it doesn’t have to be a complete interruption to knock production off line
This can cause a major loss of time for customers having to restart machines…this means $$$$$ for your customers
We address this problem proactively as well
We provide infrared scanning free of charge to our KA customers annually-covering switch gear and panel boxes
Provides early detection of possible problems to come
Provides an introduction to the service to our customer and gives them a contact for a more thorough scanning
We also use this same service to evaluate our own electric utility system for possible failures in the system
We pursue an aggressive tree trimming program to avoid problems with limbs and to some degree squirrels
We also provide workshops to help our KA customers recognize power quality problems
Provide training to all customer contact and on-site service staff for techniques to identify warning signs and the process to report them – help avoid a situation
Examples of power quality problems with KA customers

8. Follow Up Follow Up Phone Call
Check on Company down time and how the event affected their production
Listen to Concerns for references to possibly avoid problems in future
Their production concerns are yours – let them know their business is important to you and your utility
Follow up whether it be a power outage or power quality event is essential to building those relationships with your KA customers
Provide opportunities for customers to provide feedback (whether positive or negative). This positions you as a strong reliable leader and caretaker of your customers’ needs. Don’t be afraid of their criticism – they WILL respect you in the morning!
This lets them know their business is important to you
It’s a win-win situation for all…when their companies are considering relocation…those customers will always remember that their hometown utility takes care of them and cares about their bottom line

9. Summary
Customer communications are the building blocks of Key Account relationships
Be proactive – engage vigilant efforts to help customers avoid negative events
Building trust means always telling the TRUTH
Don’t be afraid to ask for feedback – they won’t bite!
EVERY action you take or contact you make contributes to the relationship – make sure each is positive and is taken with the customer’s needs in mind.
Customers have LONG memories.
Blah, Blah, Blah – Kim, you don’t need any help doing that!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!