Reduce Bill Confusion With Proactive, Personalized Outreach

“Why is my phone bill $40 higher than last month?”

We’ve all had a question like this after reviewing a statement. Think back to the last time you were confused about an increase in a recurring bill. What did you do?

• Drop what you were doing and investigate—looking up (or digging out) your previous statement and making comparisons to try and diagnose the increase
• Put it off for later because you didn’t have time to look into it
• Call the contact center to speak to a representative

Whichever option you went with, it was likely a frustrating experience. Nobody likes a bill increase, but the confusion makes it worse, and it’s an all-too-common experience in industries that have subscription offers and monthly recurring bills, including the telecommunications industry.

As end consumers, we often avoid reading our bills because many statements are confusingly designed. One of the top five billing statement sins that damage customer experience (CX) is “not explaining changes since the previous bill.”

Not only is this a major shortcoming in the current billing experience, it’s also a key driver for unwanted inbound calls. According to research conducted by CSG across more than 64 enterprise organizations, nearly half (41%) of respondents said billing-related calls made up 25-50% of their total annual inbound call volume.

This creates a huge opportunity for telecommunication providers and other businesses to improve bill comprehension and reduce billing-related inquiries by simplifying the billing experience—that is, clearly explaining charges and proactively outlining changes in monthly bills for targeted customers.

The High Cost of Confusing Bills

A recurring bill is the primary customer experience touchpoint for wireless and internet service providers. Typically, these customers don’t have any contact with the business unless there’s a problem. This makes communication surrounding the billing statement a critical determinant of CX and trust in the brand.

When a recurring bill differs from the previous month, consumers:

• Experience confusion—even irritation. Bill confusion was the main driver for billing calls, according to 69% of respondents in the same CSG study. Generic messages or bills are often overlooked by customers, so they often discover changes through their bank statements rather than their interaction with your brand.
• Attempt to decipher the bill. Consumers may scan the fine print or take to the website, only to find general and vague explanations—compounding the frustration and lack of clarity.
• Call the contact center. Based on our research, 70% of billing-related callers need a simple bill explanation or resolution of an account discrepancy.

Not only do excessive inbound billing calls hurt the bottom line, but they also contribute to downstream issues, namely collections and churn.

Consumers who are habitually frustrated by this experience will:

• Delay paying the bill. If consumers can’t figure out why this month’s bill is higher than last month’s and they don’t want to spend time on the phone, they might postpone paying their bill (or pause the autopay feature). They may even miss the payment due date altogether.
• Switch providers. Customers who are frustrated with a brand’s billing process may take their business elsewhere. A recent study found that telecom is the industry hardest hit by churn, at 46%. Customer loyalty to telecom providers is down by 22% post-pandemic due to poor customer experience, with 21% of consumers switching providers after a single shoddy service experience. Churn isn’t only an issue in telecom: It’s also weighing down revenues in the financial services (14.1%), insurance (13.5%) and healthcare (11.1%) industries.
• Downgrade service. If customers are uncertain about charges on their bills, they may choose to downgrade their service. When consumers are billed for features or services they don’t understand or deem unnecessary, they are likely to remove these items from their package, seeking to lower their costs. This can significantly impact their Customer Lifetime Value (CLV), as the ongoing revenue from these customers decreases.

You can prevent these issues by taking a proactive, personalized approach to billing communication with personalized explanations and thoughtful targeting. But what would that take?

Generative AI Can Help Bring Down Billing Barriers

A better billing experience starts with better, digitally enabled processes. Perhaps the most daunting obstacle to overcome is the sheer amount of complexity that exists on the billing operations backend, while considering the individualized targeting required to determine who is the right fit for this communication. A family of four could receive more than 1,500 variations to their bill that could influence month-to-month changes. One customer could be going through a payment plan, and the last thing they want to see is another bill communication. There is where generative AI (GenAI) and its capabilities for intelligent personalization can have a huge impact.

GenAI can employ large language models (LLMs) to:

• Extract and ingest billing data, comparing previous statements with current statements to detect any anomalies
• Explain changes with a “too long; didn’t read” plain-language summary that goes beyond the what to provide more detail into why changes occurred
• Answer questions about customers’ bills with plain language responses to create a unique dialogue regarding a bill
• Translate summaries into local language that’s more likely to be understood by end users, ultimately increasing bill comprehension
• Not only can GenAI help billing operations and contact center teams, but it will also help meet the needs of end consumers.

Say Goodbye to Bill Confusion With Billing Explanation

CSG Bill Explainer is our answer to overcoming billing operational complexities and personalizing digital experiences at scale across the bill-to-payment journey. This solution uses AI-powered explanation to deliver a personalized experience surrounding billing. Designed specifically to anticipate and prevent bill confusion, Bill Explainer taps the power of Microsoft Azure OpenAI to personalize consumer bill insights across thousands of complex billing scenarios. Using OpenAI’s contextual, natural language abilities, Bill Explainer helps consumers easily understand what’s changed in their bill so there are no surprises.

Targeted consumers receive a communication in their preferred channel with a unique link to a dynamic microsite where they can click through the statement, drilling down into each section to view:

• Month-to-month bill comparison with changes highlighted
• Details on each charge
• Savings opportunities
• Unexpected charges (e.g., proration events or one-time charges)

Customers can ask questions regarding their bill, with a personalized, AI-powered bill assistant that provides them a deeper, more transparent understanding of the bill.

One more click allows customers to easily pay their bill through connected gateways with CSG Forte.

With this proactive, digital self-service experience, organizations will:

• Build brand equity through billing transparency
• Inform customers of billing changes for faster speed to payment
• Alleviate friction and reduce billing-related contact

By leveraging Microsoft technologies, CSG is helping companies call out the what and the why behind bill changes and simplify the billing experience. This means less confusion for your customers, stronger customer loyalty and better business results.