Umniah is among the most reliable telecommunications providers in Jordan. It is also the fastest growing telecommunication company in the region. The Company offers a wide variety of high-quality internet, mobile, and enterprise-related products and services. It has around 3 million customers – an incredible feat in a competitive market.
To ensure sustained growth, Umniah had to address several challenges, such as the expansion of revenue streams, extending its service time with less cost and easier access to the services.
Umniah collaborated with SEDCO to introduce self-service payment kiosks. These kiosks integrated UWallet services, 3rd party bill payment services powered by eFawateercom-and other telecom services to ensure 24/7 availability.
- Reducing Workload at Stores
- Providing Mobile Money Services
- Expanding Sales Channels to Increase Revenue
- Enhancing Umniah Geographical Coverage
- Reducing Operating Costs
- Introducing Convenient Customer Journeys
Business Situation
To ensure sustained growth, Umniah had to address several challenges, such as the expansion of revenue streams and easier access to its services. A growing trend among telecom operators is to generate revenue via non-telecom services. Umniah attempted to focus on the same. The telecom operator emphasized on introducing innovation that went beyond its core telecom services. It wanted to generate revenue from FinTech services such as UWallet (Umniah’s mobile wallet services) and bill payment services like eFawateercom. Umniah sought to implement self-service solutions that could help address these challenge areas. Successfully doing so will extend the Company's working time, capture new customers, and serve existing ones more conveniently.
The solution
Umniah collaborated with SEDCO to devise a solution that would allow it to address the Company’s problem areas in a cost-efficient manner.
In the first step, SEDCO worked to integrate Umniah’s UWallet services into self-service kiosks. Umniah adopted this solution to extend their working hours and make their telecom services available 24/7 to customers. The integration of UWallet into self-service kiosks also enabled Umniah to provide customers with increased convenience and proximity to their services. Umniah self-service kiosks received an average of 29,000 visits per month. Customers could use these self-service kiosks from SEDCO to perform cash-in/cash-out transactions. The average duration for top-up transactions via the machines is less than 1 minute. Moreover, Umniah was able to introduce an extra payment channel in cash and coins.
Umniah was also able to provide 3rd party bill payment services through these kiosks. The Company worked with SEDCO to integrate eFawateercom within its self-service solutions, enabling both Umniah customers and non-Umniah customers to use the multifunction kiosks to pay for all kinds of bills.
The payment kiosks developed for Umniah are the first of their kind in the country. They are the only payment kiosks capable of cash and coin payment and dispensing. Some of the services that the self-service kiosks offer include:
- Cash-in and cash-out capabilities
- UWallet Payment
- Money Transfer
- Balance inquiry
- Bill payments powered by eFAWATEERcom (water, electricity, traffic tickets, and social security)
- Mobile Top-up
- Ordinary bill payment
- 24/7 service availability
So far, Umniah has installed 20 payment kiosks across the country, with the installation of 30 more machines to follow. These kiosks have been installed within branches and public areas. Besides solving operational challenges, the kiosks have also allowed Umniah to embrace the trend of digital branch transformation and facilitate the customer journey.
Benefits
The solution empowered Umniah to achieve the following:
Reducing Workload at Stores Through Self-Service Solutions
The machines helped resolve the operational challenges that Umniah was dealing with. By redirecting customers to self-service kiosks and encouraging them to use Umniah’s digital branch transformation solutions, the Company could:
- Reduce the need for direct engagement with sta, thereby allowing branches to work at optimal capacity.
- Automate essential operations and services offered by Umniah, enabling the staff to focus more on generating sales and growing the Company’s customer base.
Providing Mobile Money Services
The self-service payment kiosks were designed to function as cash-in and cash-out kiosks. Customers could use them to access mobile money services and deposit or withdraw the money transferred to them via UWallet directly through the self-service machines. Moreover, they could pay their bills via the machines and utilize the service at any time as per their convenience.
Expanding Sales Channels to Increase Revenue
The installation of self-service kiosks also enabled Umniah to meet its primary objective of expanding sales channels and providing FinTech/Non-Telco services such as bill payment to generate revenue. Umniah could also use these kiosks to increase cross-selling opportunities, maximize footfall, and enhance customer service.
Enhancing Umniah Geographical Coverage
Installing the payment kiosks in public locations enabled Umniah to target more customers and increase its geographical coverage without opening new branches. Compared to a new branch location, the installation of these kiosks also required a significantly lower capital investment.
Reducing Operating Costs
Since Umniah was able to reduce their recruitment and hiring expenditures and control capital investment to establish new branches, they could minimize their operating costs and improve their overall efficiency.
Introducing Convenient Customer Journeys
The payment kiosks allow Umniah to serve its customers better by providing access to services beyond standard working hours. This allows customers to avail of these services as per their own convenience. The decrease in human interaction via automation also enabled Umniah to introduce safer customer journeys and abide by COVID-19 health and safety regulations. It allowed Umniah to ensure social distancing while continuing to offer round-the-clock services to customers.
Watch the video to learn more about how SEDCO self-service kiosks can enhance the customer experience in the telecom industry
Adopt advanced self-service solutions to make your telecom services available to customers 24/7
