Telecom

Location data key to Telecom’s customer service

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NZ MasterMap helps Telecom reach their customers no matterwhere they live.

Challenge: Location, location, location

In the telecommunications business location information is 80% of a company’s knowledge base.

Telecom’s Solution Engineer Ken McGeady says the first step towards servicing customers and maintaining the company’s telecommunications assets is knowing exactly where they are.

“It may sound very simple, but a written address for a customer isn’t enough. We need to know the exact physical location of their home or business so we know exactly where to send our service team. And, we need to know where our cables, and cabinets are in relation to that property.”

Ken says a well-managed, up-to-date and standardised database of geo­graphic data is key. He says Terralink’s data is updated every 20 minutes and they are looking to improve that even further.

“When we receive a customer’s request for service we have to validate their address before we create a service requirement and can send someone out to help them. Therefore, we need geographic data on all roads, including new streets and subdivisions so we can find every address. Every time we access the database we need to be confident that we’re looking at an exact record,” he says.

Solution: Access to the best information available

Ken says despite Telecom’s reliance on location information for their day-to-day business, creating their own geographic database wasn’t an option for the company.

“It’s better to leave it to the experts and that’s why we chose Terralink and their NZ MasterMap to validate physical addresses.”

The NZ MasterMap database is New Zealand’s most complete, timely, and accurate land and property database. It contains 13 layers of geographic data, including tens of thousands more addresses and more kilometres of roads than any other database in New Zealand.

“The different layers of information; cadastre, aerial imagery, local authority data, addressing data are all useful to us. And, in turn we contribute to the gathering of address information within our customer processes so this can be validated and added to the national database. It’s a mutual relationship that works, and with Terralink’s help we can understand where every piece of network is in relation to our customers.

“With NZ MasterMap information we can produce Telecom location codes for every address which makes finding our customers an efficient process.”

Business benefit: Raising the service standard

Ken says ultimately Terralink’s NZ MasterMap helps them provide a higher standard of service to their customers.

“The accuracy of their data means we can provide the highest level of customer service because we know where to contact them no matter where they live.

“The more responsive we can be to our customers the more loyal they become. It makes good business sense.”