SeeClickFix
CEO Ben Berkowitz.
New Haven’s SeeClickFix might just have a pre-packaged solution to UI’s and CL&P’s communication woes. The question is whether the corporate culture of Connecticut’s utility monopolies could accept a more transparent system of handling customer issues.
There is little question that internal communication channels within both major electric utilities have failed. The reason for this appears to be that their customer service departments do not have access to information used by line crews to report progress on repairs. Further, it appears as though customer service personnel are unable to effectively supply line crews with information from customers. So while data exists in both the internal- and customer-facing sides of the company, it is completely incompatible.
Social media platforms haven’t been helpful either, because the utility companies have put their marketing departments in charge social media accounts. The result? A one-way communication stream that is tailored to the mass media and broad audiences with hundreds of customer complaints piling up unanswered on their Facebook pages and Twitter feeds.
Enter SeeClickFix.
The New Haven-based social-media site developed a free reporting platform that helps solve the age-old problem of facilitating effective communication between residents and government on the status of things like pothole repair, graffiti, and other non-emergency problems. With a little bit of initiative from the utility companies, SeeClickFix CEO Ben Berkowitz says the system could be up and running quickly for their customers.
“All it would take is maybe an hour of set-up time to get them in a place where they could enable citizens to report via the web or mobile applications,” Berkowitz said.
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