Eckoh expands contract with Utilita Group
21 March 2011
Eckoh plc
("Eckoh" or "the Company")
Eckoh expands contract with Utilita Group
Launch of new mobile phone 'top-up' payment service for gas and electricity provider
Eckoh, the UK's leading developer of speech recognition solutions for customer contact centres, is pleased to announce the expansion of its three-year contract with Utilita Group ("Utilita"), as announced by the Company on 6th September 2010, to include the provision of an additional payment capability using the mobile phone.
The new service - which is now live - enables Utilita's customers to purchase electricity or gas via SMS. The EckohPAY product handles payments in a PCI compliant manner, and can be deployed through speech, web, mobile and smartphone applications.
Utilita is an independent UK company, licensed by Ofgem and Ofcom to supply gas and electricity, and is committed to helping households become energy efficient and reduce carbon emissions through the provision of smart meters, energy-efficient products and advice.
Utilita customers that have pre-pay meters can purchase electricity or gas using the EckohPAY SMS service. Customers register their mobile number online and when they want to 'top-up', they send an SMS message with their electric or gas card number and the amount they wish to pay to a dedicated shortcode. Once the details are validated and authorised, the customer is issued a code to activate the purchased electricity or gas.
Bill Bullen, Managing Director and Founder of Utilita, commented: "Following the successful launch of Eckoh's web payment solution last year, we were keen to work with them to expand the scope of services offered to our customers. With this new mobile payment facility, our customers have another convenient and secure method for purchasing their electricity or gas, and we expect to add further services during the course of our contract."
Nik Philpot, Chief Executive Officer of Eckoh, added: "We are delighted that Utilita have chosen to adopt Eckoh's mobile payment solution, and this demonstrates the value that our EckohPAY solution has already delivered them. This new agreement shows the breadth of Eckoh's offering - covering speech, web, mobile and smartphone applications - which enables our clients to increase customer satisfaction through enhancing consumer choice and convenience whilst improving operational efficiency."
Ends
Enquiries:
Eckoh plc
Nik Philpot, Chief Executive Officer
Adam Moloney, Group Finance Director
www.eckoh.com Tel: 01442 458 300
Corfin Public Relations
Harry Chathli, Claire Norbury Tel: 020 7596 2860
Singer Capital Markets
Shaun Dobson Tel: 020 3205 7500
Notes to Editors:
About Eckoh plc
Eckoh plc (AIM: ECK) is the UK's leading developer of speech recognition for customer contact centres.
Eckoh's sophisticated technology enables routine enquiries, transactions or payments to be processed without the need for the consumer to actually talk to an agent. This significantly reduces its clients' operational costs, whilst freeing up agents to deal with more complex enquiries. Eckoh is the largest developer of such hosted services in the UK.
Eckoh also provides complementary web, mobile and smartphone applications to its portfolio of blue chip clients.
Eckoh's secure and resilient infrastructure has the scalability to handle over 650,000 calls an hour and up to 8,000 calls simultaneously, which means calls can always be answered no matter how unpredictable the circumstances.
For more information, visit: www.eckoh.com
About Utilita Group
Utilita is majority owned by one of the worlds largest smart meter manufactures (Secure Meters) and is leading the way in providing smart meter solutions in the domestic and commercial pre-payment market, lowering the costs and providing vulnerable members of society and small business under increasing economic pressure with the ability to accurately monitor their energy use
We are a small, independent company and are dedicated to giving excellent service with plain language and no fuss. We are fully licensed by Ofgem and Ofcom and have our own team to help you. We want to save you money and to save energy, with all the environmental benefits which that brings.
For more information, visit: www.utilita.co.uk
This information is provided by RNS