Celebrating a Customer Service Week win

Customers are at the heart of everything we do. We all play a role in making sure our communities thrive. This is why we’re excited to be celebrating Customer Service Week. And what better way to kick it off than letting you know about an innovation award we’re proud of.

Our people recently designed Visual Connect. This clever tool won gold in this year's Australian Business Awards. The tool allows callers to stream live footage from their phones when they’re seeing a fault or emergency. 

Data doesn't lie! The results are overwhelming. Visual Connect reduces the need for site visits by 40%. This means we are saving more than 5,500 resource hours, around 189,000 driving kilometres and over 20 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions.

Problem solving teams come together 

We deliver water services across a huge expanse of 2.5 million square kilometres. When things go wrong like leaks or bursts, we need to prioritise repairs. These decisions are in the best interests of our customers. 

Homes and businesses are usually the first to notice incidents happening. Our improvement team wanted to tap into this neighbourhood watch further.

They took to observing our emergency phone calls. What they found was it's often difficult to visualise the fault. Customers tried their best to recall what they saw. Sometimes there was too much detail, and other times, not enough. Operators had to then assess what crew was needed and how critical the issue was with this information.

The big idea 

After looking into different ideas, the best option was for operators to send callers a link via SMS. This would allow the caller to send photos, and livestream what they’re seeing. We were able to remove confusion from the equation. 

This nifty tool became known as Visual Connect. The idea was on its way to becoming a reality for our operators and customers.

The pilot program soon launched and produced even better results than anticipated. More than 90% of callers were keen to try the system, and 38% of callers were able to fix the fault themselves or understood how to explain the issue to a plumber.

With such impressive results, it was a no-brainer to roll out Visual Connect to the wider business. Other teams soon jumped on board. Now we use the tool for things like checking meters and quality assurance checks.

Award winning results 

Visual Connect provides a better experience for customers from the moment they contact us. We’re driving down emissions by reducing unnecessary site visits, and customers are part of the solution to save water. Thank you to our people. We’re celebrating you this week! 

Learn more about the way we work

We directly employ more than 3,800 people across the state, providing a high level of expertise and strong commitment to communities. Learn more about the way we work.