CBMS: Taking care of our business customers
by Robert Yang | Jan. 16, 2020
Our customers matter, and we always want to provide excellent customer service. Residential customers are serviced by our field and in-house representatives, and larger corporations or organizations are assigned to key account managers. So who supports our small business customers?
Before 2013, we didn’t have a department whose sole focus was to take care of our small business customers on Oahu. To address this void, Hawaiian Electric created the Customer Business Management Services Department or CBMS. I recently shadowed CBMS business consultants Resti Paguirigan and Alton Ramos on a Friday morning as they visited three small business customers, from one side of the island to the other. It was an eye-opening experience!
For our CBMS business consultant on Oahu, there’s rarely two days that are the same. Keep in mind, about 10 percent of our customers on Oahu are small businesses and each one has its own unique set of issues that need to be addressed. Whether the issues center on billing, energy efficiency, demand response programs, system reliability or power quality, no problem is too small or large. Some inquiries or issues can be resolved through phone or email, but many require our CBMS consultants to travel to the business itself
Many small business customers request information on their energy use. To address this, CBMS business consultants travel to those businesses and install on-site energy monitoring and diagnostics equipment. In fact, when I rode along with Resti and Alton, two out of the three visits stemmed from small business customers wanting to know their energy usage. It takes about an hour and at least two people to install the energy monitoring and diagnostics equipment into a business’s electrical system. Afterward, the equipment is left alone to do its job for a week before being removed. Follow-up visits are then done to inform the small business customers of their energy usage. The data is usually displayed through complex informational charts and graphs. During the ride-along, I was very impressed with Resti and Alton’s ability to breakdown technical findings into words and analogies that their customers could easily understand. They also suggest recommendations on how the customer could reduce their energy usage.
The CBMS team also responds to outages (day or night, scheduled or unplanned) that any of our small business customers may experience. In the middle of the ride-along, Alton mentioned that he had worked the night before to keep small business customers along Hobron Lane in Waikiki informed as crews did a pole replacement project, which required a scheduled outage for safety reasons. Prior to the outage, Alton made sure to alert and help the affected businesses prepare for it.
During an outage, CBMS business consultants will be there for their customers until the power gets restored. This is an unwritten tradition of the CBMS team. “For every minute a business is out of power, that’s revenue they’re potentially losing out on, which is why we need to be there for our customers and make sure that the power is safely and efficiently restored,” Alton said when I asked him about this commitment.
As the ride-along concluded, I asked Resti and Alton how the department is evolving. They shared how they are incorporating a lot of new technology such as drones and thermal imaging.
“Imagine if a business customer came up to you and told you that their solar system isn’t operating correctly, we could fly our drones above the building and locate any potential objects blocking the panels or see if any of the panels are damaged,” Resti said. “Maybe the system appears fine, but we could take an extra step and use infrared to see which panels aren’t working correctly.” That’s pretty cool stuff.
I appreciated the time I got to spend with Resti and Alton in learning about their team. Our small business customers are in good hands. If you’re a small business customer on Oahu, and you have any questions or concerns regarding your electrical service, please give our CBMS team a call at 543–7777. They will take care of you!
Robert Yang is a digital communications and social media specialist at Hawaiian Electric Company.
