“Our Business – Revenue Collections & Payments”

“Our Business – Revenue Collections & Payments”

Utility Payment Conference 2008

Tuesday, October 21

9:15 to 9:45 a.m.

Presented By: Wes Friesen, Portland General Electric

PGE Quick Facts

119 years old Headquarters = Portland, OR 52 cities / 1,594,000 population

Generation 8 Hydro 3 Natural

Gas/Oil 1 Wind 1 Coal

Customer base 702,000

residential 98,375

commercial 260 industrial

“WE DO THIS EVERY DAY”

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Ever Feel Like Doing This? Managing Payments can be stressful!

Identical Dolphins Stress Test…

Cash Flow Is King (Queen)!!

Remember……..

Print & Mail Team (Bill Production)

Supervisor = Eric Houger (503-464-7882; [email protected])

Print & Mail Services• IBM 4000 printers; Pitney Bowes Inserters (APS, FPS); other

print and mail related equipment and software

• Only electric utility in the nation that is MPTQM certified

• Have earned multiple national awards for Excellence (e.g. earlier this year earned NAPL’s Gold Award)

• 100% Same Day production of bills for over 6 straight years, with zero significant errors!

• Maximize postal discounts ($3m savings) via selective/intelligent inserting and automation/sortation work sharing

PGE Cash Remittance TeamSupervisor = Elyssia Carlblom503-425-1654; [email protected]

Cash Remittance• Infrastructure: Opex w/imaging, Unisys Transports;

Unisys R & L software• Processes all mail-in payments for PGE: Agency, Light

and Power, non-Light and Power• Started ARC processing (converting checks) in March

2007• Redeem PGE Gift Cards via Marksense• Marksense for address changes/customer comments• Use of “bangtails” for promoting PGE programs• On-line Archive of stub/check images• 5 straight years of 100% same-day processing; error

rate less than .02% • ISO 9001 certification in process

COMMUNITY OFFICESSupervisor = Gil Rodriguez 503-612-3754; [email protected]

Community Offices

• Processes walk-in and drop box payments (7 different locations)

• Created PGE Gift Card Program• Process MasterCard credit and

debit cards with no fee to customer (pilot program)

• Started processing checks via Remote Deposit in February 2008

PAY OPTIONSSupervisor = Barb Byers (503-612-3911; [email protected])

Pay Options• Express Pay Locations (EPL’s)

• Vcom Kiosks

• Automatic Monthly Payments (ACH)

• PGE IVR check payment – no fee

• Electronic Credit/Debit Card Payments via Third Party (with fee)

• On-line Payments (bank websites, money management software, PGE’s website)

• EDI – Electronic Data Interchange for large customers

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portlandgeneral.com & portlandgeneral.biz.

Customer Bills (August 2008)• Paper Bills = 754,213 (91%; year ago was

768,952 - 94%)• E-Bills = 74,963 (9%; year ago was 50,837 -

6%)

E-Bills are growing; paper bills are slightly declining

Paper comes from PGE Customer Boise Cascade, using sustainable fiber sources: construction/lumber mill wood waste; re-cycled paper; sustainable and certified tree farms/forests

Environmental Certifications (FSC/SFI) received or in process

PGE Payment Trends

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Continuous Improvement & Continuous Learning

Never Stop Learning!

The Three P’s Key to Success

1. Physical Assets & Technology

2. People

3. Practices & Processes

“Our Business – Revenue Collections & Payments”

Documents

Transcript of “Our Business – Revenue Collections & Payments”