Software for Utilities supports AMI and renewable energy.
August 27, 2009 -
As customer information system (CIS)/billing software solution, Customer Suite v4.2 enhances utility clients' ability to incorporate advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) capabilities and renewable energy into their customer management systems. Billing and security features, such as support for PCI security standards, further enhance this customer management system, which is capable of managing all of utility's - gas, water, electric - customer-facing processes.
Enhanced Ventyx Customer Suite Reflects Growing Demand for Software Supporting AMI and Renewable Energy Rates
Wealth of New Features Added to Time-Proven Customer Management Solution
ATLANTA, Aug. 18 -- Ventyx , the world's largest private software, data and advisory services provider to the energy and utility industry, today announced the newest release of its Customer Suite customer information system (CIS)/billing software solution. The release includes features enhancing utility clients' ability to incorporate advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) capabilities and renewable energy into their customer management systems, as well as enhanced billing and security features.
Ventyx Customer Suite is the most comprehensive customer management system available, capable of managing all of a utility's customer-facing processes, from meter reads to billing and customer inquiries through the call center or self-service and service management. The solution's extensive breadth of features are time-proven across gas, water and electric utilities.
The latest release of Customer Suite, Release 4.2, includes several key new features, including the following:
-- Support for renewable energy rates and AMI metering. New net metering features enable Customer Suite to enroll customers in renewable energy programs, measure energy generated and consumed on a single meter, bill customers for services and refund/credit customers for remaining excess generation.
-- Enhanced security. Expanded support for the Payment Card Industry (PCI) security standards.
-- Enhancements to master summary billing. Improved flexibility in querying master bill history and detailed views.
-- Technology upgrades. Technical currency improvements such as migration to the Oracle 11g database platform.
-- Usability improvements. Improved address maintenance and online help enhancements.
"This latest release of Customer Suite truly reflects our clients' increasing demand for software that supports their key business initiatives in the dynamically changing utility industry, such as deploying AMI systems and supporting renewable energy rates," said Ventyx President and Chief Operating Officer Steve Carpenter. "We collaborated closely with our clients on many of the release's functional enhancements to ensure this new release provides the feature set they need to respond to the new challenges of today's utility industry. As we continue to expand and modernize Customer Suite to meet the industry's evolving requirements, our clients will remain active and vital participants in these efforts."
The new features targeting renewables integration were key for some clients considering migrating to the 4.2 release. "One of the main reasons Longmont wanted to migrate to 4.2 is the net metering capability," said Information Systems Administrator/Coordinator Sherri Spengler of City of Longmont, CO. "Right now, we are doing those calculations by hand, so this will be a great time saver. I tested the 4.2 version a few weeks ago and was really impressed with the net metering, addressing and the general layout of the system. We have been looking forward to the release so we can start our migration."
For other clients, the full set of enhanced features make the release compelling. John J. McAleenan Jr., Anchorage Water and Wastewater's (AWWU) Customer Service Division Director, said, "Based on our implementation of a prerelease version, it seems migrating to Customer Suite 4.2 will allow us to improve efficiencies in several areas. It will allow us to better manage our delinquency process for customers on payment arrangements, bill one-time charges to our customers who may not have an associated premise, and properly handle unclaimed refund checks and the escheatment process in a lot less time. Customer Suite 4.2 will also enhance our superior customer service by providing the ability to manage meter communication devices, enabling us to accept one-time bank draft payments and providing us a more comprehensive approach to mailing address hierarchies so that we have fewer returned mail items, resulting in significant time savings. The move to Oracle 11g and PCI-compliance were additional reasons for migrating to 4.2."
Utility Billing & CIS Manager Solomon Fields of Lubbock Power and Light said, "The migration to Customer Suit 4.2 will provide numerous new technical and functional enhancements which will improve our ability to provide excellent customer service to our customers and address service issues within our business operations. We look forward to having the newest technologies available for handling our customer's request for utility service."
These and many other Ventyx clients are either migrating or planning to migrate to this latest release of the software. With Release 4.2, Ventyx continues to expand and enhance the robust features of its highly successful Version 4 series of Customer Suite. As of today, nearly 30 percent of Ventyx Customer Suite clients have already migrated to the Version 4 series. Furthermore, even before the general availability of Customer Suite Release 4.2, several Ventyx clients had already made plans to implement the new solution. Among these clients are Anchorage Water and Wastewater; County of Manatee, FL; City of Columbia, SC; City of Lubbock, TX; City of Longmont, CO; Narragansett Electric; Eugene Water and Electric Board; and City of Garland, TX. And, many others are considering migrating.
Customer Suite 4.2 is available immediately from Ventyx and its certified reseller partners. For more information, contact your Ventyx sales representative or email sales@ventyx.com.
About Ventyx
Ventyx is a leading business solutions provider, delivering asset management, mobile workforce management, energy portfolio management, and customer care solutions to more than 1,250 energy, utility and communications customers, as well as to asset-intensive customers in selected commercial markets. Ventyx delivers best-of-breed business solutions that maximize operational and financial performance, backed by the industry's deepest available industry-specific domain expertise. For more information, visit our Website at www.ventyx.com.
Ventyx is a registered trademark of Ventyx Inc. Other company and product names may be trademarks of the respective companies with which they are associated.
Contacts:
Marketing:
Gary Frazier
USA
Phone: 770-989-4188 E-mail this person Company Information: Name: Ventyx Address: 3301 Windy Ridge Parkway City: Atlanta State: GA ZIP: 30339 Country: USA Phone: 770-952-8444 FAX: 770-989-4231 http://www1.ventyx.com
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