As broadband providers look to in-home networks as a means of enhancing productivity, communications and entertainment, customer service costs are predicted to escalate significantly, according to new research by Dallas-based Parks Associates.
The report, titled “Digital Home Services: Carriers, Retailers and the Consumer,” projects that customer support costs for home networks alone could exceed $200 million annually for U.S. broadband providers.
“Assuming that few enhancements are made in monitoring broadband and in-home networks between now and 2011, customer support costs will escalate significantly as subscribers turn in growing numbers to their broadband service providers to solve in-home networking issues,” says Kurt Scherf, Parks Associates’ vice president and principal analyst. “Given the pressure on service providers to boost not only revenue but also profits and margin, we’re urging them to take proactive steps to assuage these costs.”
Scherf says he identified eight elements critical to enhancing customer support capabilities and reducing support costs for broadband service providers. These key requirements for building enhanced customer support include developing robust solutions to simplify CPE and hardware installation, improving service provision, automating troubleshooting services, building metrics-gathering solutions, and enhancing help desk support systems, which could include the development of dynamic knowledge databases and other operation support system (OSS) features.
The new report offers insight on the drivers for digital home support solutions. It profiles more than 40 companies in the digital home support value chain and offers more than 60 primary consumer data points. The report also provides U.S. forecasts for digital home support services, including remote and on-site troubleshooting and in-home PC installation and setup through 2011.
