| 4. In which ways is the initiative creative and innovative?
|
|
MWA has applied Information Network Technology to improve services for customers, to improve convenience for customers and have them spend less time when accessing MWA services. The objective of the project can be specified as follows:
1. Improve customer service levels by applying Idea Innovation with technology developed by MWA and satisfying stakeholder needs.
2. Improve ways to access branch offices for customers by considering the problems of insufficient car parking and other unsatisfactory factors faced by customers.
3. Increase service levels by eliminating weaknesses in working of public sectors and decreasing budget for expansion of service areas.
Strategies applied to achieving the objectives of the project are:
1. Planning working process: to analyze the possibilities, consider rules and regulations to create a working plan, time frame, person in charge etc. to implement the project.
2. Design and construction: to consider the possibility of allocating space for drive-thru points, under design representing images of MWA, standardized construction but flexible with real locations within a reasonable budget.
3. Project publicity: to make customers understand howto access the office, rules and regulations and to draw customer attention as much as possible.
4. Monitoring and evaluation: to specify working processes, following up and evaluating the results for summarizing data, value of the project and impacts to improve the project.
|
|
| 5. Who implemented the initiative and what is the size of the population affected by this initiative?
|
|
The stakeholders can be divided in three groups as follows:
1. Executives: MWA Board of Directors, MWA chief executives and Branch Office Managers have pushed the project to come up with successful results within a short period and with a clear working process.
2. Operation Group: Project Managers, Information Technology staff and branch office officers have planned the project, controlled work to be done on time (which was within the end of fiscal year 2010) to quickly solve the problems for customers.
3. Customers: customers have an important part as they reflect defects of the project from real situations after starting the first session.
Those three groups lead to project follow up, evaluation and extend to other branch offices.
|
| 6. How was the strategy implemented and what resources were mobilized?
|
|
Financial: in 2010, Prachachuen Branch Office spent about THB 300,000 and, in the next year, the capital was raised by about THB 100,000 for each branch, the capital is for payment device facilities and other necessary facilities built to represent the image of MWA with no other financial cost.
Technical: The technical program applied in the project is developed by MWA and is the same as in the normal office. Moreover,the risks in working operations are controlled by using CCTV for security when make payment.
Personnel: each branch allocates two staff per day to be responsible for the Drive thru point. For other concerned tasks, the staff is from the Public Relations Department, Audit Department and Information Technology Department. This staff has a part in project publication, audit working, planning the information technology system and development in human resources so that staff can work in various conditions but still keep the impressive style of MWA as in the normal office. It could be said that, in this project, all the resources are used in a way so it will not cost any excess.
|
|
| 7. Who were the stakeholders involved in the design of the initiative and in its implementation?
|
|
Since the project has started in July 2010 at Prachachuen Branch Office. The success outcomes of the project are:
1. This project could clearly reduce congestion in branch office areas so MWA executives have agreed to extend the project to other branch offices, especially those in urban areas such as Phrakhanong Branch Office, Sukhumvit Branch Office,Phaya Thai Branch Office, and Phasicharoen Branch Office. At present, there are eight branch offices participating in this project.
2. Because of the expansion of the project to other branch offices, the number of customers using this service has increased. From an initial level of approximately 2,000 customers at Prachachuen Branch Office, at present there are roughly 50,000 customers per office.
3. Improving convenience for customers is a key benefit of service time reduction.Initially each payment took 7 minutes. However, this has now been reduced to about 5.30 minutes.
4. Reducing customers’ expenses. Previously, some customers could not come to the office because of congestion. They had to pay an agency service fee of THB 10 per bill. This service fee totaled about THB 500,000 per month (50,000 customers x THB 10 service fee)
5. Raising the company’s service level to be more professional, improving the company’s image and raising customer satisfaction. The score of customer satisfaction towards our organization increased from 3.680 in 2009 to 4.259 in 2013.
|
|
| 8. What were the most successful outputs and why was the initiative effective?
|
|
Session 1: Project Initialization
The project is evaluated by concerned functions and following-up the outcomes to avoid any delays in the project. The processes are updating working procedures, working rules and regulations, IT installation, staff training, payment point construction and any other necessary areas. In the meantime, the outcomes are reported to executives periodically.
Session 2: Pilot Project
The first project was launched at Prachachuen Branch Office. In the first three months, the project was followed-up by surveys of customer satisfaction from 300 customers, including questionnaires about any problems in order to improve the project. The customer surveys were from many channels such as websites and the 1125 call center, then the data was summarized and the results were reported to executives for further action.
Session 3: Magnify an outcome
The executives decided to extend the project to other branch offices and assigned the Monitoring and Evaluation Department to let credible institutions make surveys every year on customer satisfaction both at organization level and branch office level. Also, specify working standards both in quality and quantity. These procedures aim to achieve the ultimate results, that is, the trust in state agency services. The project follow up and evaluation have been done so that as they are now set as annual performance controlled by internal audits and considered as one of the main works of the organization.
|
|
| 9. What were the main obstacles encountered and how were they overcome?
|
|
During the beginning of the project, customers did not have much understanding about the service of the project because it was new and still had some limitations, for example, declining payments of temporary suspending fee and denying payments if more than 3 bills needed to be paid. So, we need to publicize the project through many ways such as television, radio and the Internet, to make customers clearly understand service processes and regulations. MWA has set up a special team to advise and clarify the project directly to customers. At present, there are no such problems occurring, so it can be said that the project is managed efficiently and successfully.
|