Live convergent billing helps
Vodacom Tanzania launch
tailored services rapidly
An advanced live convergent charging system is keeping Vodacom Tanzania
ahead of its market rivals by allowing it to offer exceptional customer service
based on flexible billing options and tailored offers much more quickly.
Despite its leading position in the
Tanzanian communications market,
Vodacom Tanzania found that its ability
to grow as quickly as it wanted and
capitalize on market opportunities was
being restricted. Vodacom Tanzania
faced challenges in market share,
customer satisfaction and churn.
In particular, its billing system led to
high costs and long development times
for features the company wanted to
place on the market. Vodacom
Tanzania also wanted to improve its
post-paid penetration, which was
restricted by local banking conditions.
A priority for Vodacom Tanzania was to
gain greater penetration in the small
and medium size (SME) and large
corporate markets, as well as drive its
converged business. Achieving this
would require a billing system that
offered prepaid, post-paid and hybrid
products across all types of traffic in
the network.
Vodacom also faced the challenges of
the Tanzanian market, including price
sensitivity, extreme competition,
massive price erosion and a huge
increase in volume and transactions.
Consultancy matches solution
with strategy
Vodacom Tanzania turned to Nokia
Siemens Networks to implement its
leading-edge convergent billing
system. The first stage in the ambitious
project involved consultancy to ensure
that the business drivers aligned with
the overall business strategy.
The solution itself is based on the
Nokia Siemens Networks charge@
once unified platform, which allows
real-time rating and charging and
enables a flexible mixture of payment
methods.
In practical terms, it means that a
business customer can choose
postpaid for all services used for
business purposes and a prepaid
account for private voice calls or SMS.
With this platform, family contracts are
also possible, allowing parents to pay
“I am really excited about the
benefits that this project will
deliver to Vodacom in giving us
as Vodacom the platform for
changing our business and
pushing new products into the
market in record time.”
Dietlof Mare,
Vodacom Tanzania
Managing Director
for their own voice services via a
postpaid method and use their phones
to top up their children’s prepaid
phones. The platform also allows
Vodacom to send an alert message if
the bill exceeds a limit set by the
customer. Alternatively, it can stop
network connectivity altogether, thus
allowing customers to control their
expenditure.
“The Nokia Siemens Networks unified
charging and billing platform enables
Vodacom to lead the market with
flexible payment methods,” says Dietlof
Mare, Vodacom Tanzania Managing
Director.
The solution allows Vodacom to offer
exceptional service by putting the
customer in control of their spending.
As well as online features for postpaid
subscribers and its flexible payment
features, charge@once unified offers
instant bonus and discounts, and
online access to balances. It also
allows Vodacom to improve customer
loyalty with bundles and discounts,
while also offering price transparency
that lowers entry barriers for new
value-added services.
for surfing after midnight or free SMS
at a specified time of day.
Meet market needs
New use cases can also be created,
allowing Vodacom to overcome the
intense competition in the Tanzanian
market by differentiating itself more
readily from its rivals. These features
can also help create new market
trends, while building targeted
marketing strategies in the shortest
possible time.
The flexibility of the solution allows
Vodacom Tanzania not just to meet the
needs of the market, but to influence its
development. The solution offers a
number of ready-to-run, tested and
highly customizable marketing use
cases which Vodacom can configure to
suit its needs. With this feature,
Vodacom can simply chose from a
wide variety of different modules to
create schemes such as special tariffs
The solution also contributes to more
efficient subscriber management, with
a single converged customer database
and centralized management of
product lifecycles.
Challenges
Solutions
Benefits
• Intense competition for market
share creating rising churn
• Long development times for
new services was putting a
brake on Vodacom’s growth
plans
• Inability to tailor services
efficiently to drive up customer
satisfaction and win market
share
• Consulting phase to determine
business requirements
• Migration from legacy system
to Nokia Siemens Networks
Charge@Once unified Rating
and Charging System.
• Upgrade of the OSS layer for
the solution
• Related project integration
services
•
• Vodacom Tanzania can offer
tailored services with very
short lead times
• Convergent charging enables
prepaid and post-paid
subscribers to be addressed
with the same offer to win new
post-paid revenue
• Improved customer
experience with advanced
features such as subscribermanaged real-time spending
threshold
• Rapid response to changing
market demands through
ready-made products that can
be adapted quickly and costeffectively
• Reduced Total Cost of
Ownership compared to
legacy system
Copyright 2011 Nokia Siemens Networks. All rights reserved.
Nokia Siemens Networks, Karaportti 3, FIN-02610 ESPOO, FINLAND
www.nokiasiemensnetworks.com