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Progress Energy, Salt River Project take top honors in Chartwell's 2008 marketing and customer service awards

AUSTIN, TEXAS – Oct. 13, 2008 – Two utilities were recognized Monday for their extraordinary customer relations efforts and won Chartwell’s Best Practices Awards in Customer Service and Marketing during EMACS 2008 – The Customer Experience Conference, held at the Renaissance Austin Hotel.

Phoenix-based Salt River Project won in the customer service category and Progress Energy, Raleigh, N.C., was named the marketing winner by a panel of Chartwell research analysts who cover customer relations in the utility industry.

Progress Energy was presented with the Best Practices Award for Utility Marketing for its innovative “Product Expansion Program” (PEP). The campaign is a sales-based program where call center agents use customer information to promote revenue-generating or cost-reducing energy efficient products on all applicable calls. Additionally, Progress Energy promotes these products without increasing average call handle time. PEP generated more than $1.5 million of non-regulated annualized revenue in 2007.

SRP was honored with the Best Practices Award for Customer Service for its “Smart Meter Initiatives.” The utility has installed more than 283,000 smart meters as of May 2008 under its advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) initiative. Participation in time-of-use (TOU) rates is 20% higher among customers with smart meters. SRP also is receiving high customer satisfaction marks with M-Power, a pre-pay program that has evolved over the years into a vital part of SRP’s smart metering program. M-Power customers have reduced energy consumption by an average of 12%, while SRP has collected $20 million of outstanding bad debt.

“While judging was a difficult process because of the high quality of all the entries, Progress Energy and SRP displayed the exemplary efforts and results to earn the distinction of true best practices,” says Chartwell vice president Dennis Smith. “Impressively, Progress Energy has done what many utilities only talk about – turned its call center, traditionally one of the highest sources of expenditures, into a profit channel, not just for promoting revenue-generating products but for efficiency-driven offerings such as electronic bill payment. Meanwhile, SRP continues to be a pioneer in smart metering and has put into use some innovative customer services made possible by its AMI system.

“Chartwell applauds these utilities for their outstanding efforts in achieving high customer satisfaction and using creative methods to gain operational efficiency,” Smith adds.

The Chartwell Best Practices Awards are presented by Chartwell in several categories throughout the year, with its largest awards program, The Chartwell Best Practices Awards for Marketing and Customer Service, held annually during EMACS – The Customer Experience Conference. Utilities that enter projects or programs for consideration must submit an entry form and supporting materials. The entries are judged by Chartwell researchers who are subject matter experts in the areas under consideration. There were 35 entries from North American utilities for consideration in 2008 – 16 in marketing and 19 in customer service. Past winners include PECO, LCEC, We Energies, KCP&L, Duke Energy, Sacramento Municipal Utility District, Otter Tail Power and BC Hydro.

About Chartwell

Based in Atlanta, Chartwell Inc. is a specialized information provider that facilitates knowledge exchange among utility professionals responsible for management practices and technology solutions. Chartwell publishes best practices case studies, quantitative research and electronic newsletters, and hosts conferences and other events for utility professionals. For more information, visit www.chartwellinc.com.