Retail Technology - May 2007 Managed hosting and networks company Easynet has seen the success of its Customer Service Excellence Programme pay particular dividends since its launch late last year.

Most recently, this year it announced significant business contracts from new and existing international retail-facing corporate customers of its 'Superbly Managed Solutions' Customer Excellence Programme including Coca-Cola Enterprises, Sharp Europe and ViaMichelin. The Customer Excellence programme is designed to source customer feedback, then implement, communicate and track improvements.

Martin Molloy, Easynet's European customer service director said: "We've developed a series of initiatives across Europe including European Customer Advisory Boards, frequent Customer Measurement Surveys and internal Customer Quality Boards to encourage feedback and we've made some significant changes to our business in the past 12 months based on this feedback".

ViaMichelin has been an Easynet customer for five years. Its Routeplanner service is hosted in Easynet's Data Centre in Paris, and holds more than 120 HP servers and large Cisco switches to provide the access platforms. The company has signed a new contract with Easynet worth €4 million (£2.7m) over three more years, reaffirming a strong partnership.

Molloy added: "We're delighted to see the results already in the form of these fantastic new contracts. That said, we recognise the need for constant improvement, innovation and higher customer satisfaction and are working to deliver this through day to day performance improvements as well as key strategic programmes."

The programme's strategy is made up of several key components central to Easynet's business and crucial to its customers with retail-facing businesses. A thorough business understanding is led by a consultative approach towards customers' strategic, commercial and technical objectives; and customer service management provides a dedicated personal team able to offer the highest levels of customer and operational management to meet the demands and expectations of consumers, business partners and suppliers alike, while regular customer service round-the-clock performance reporting backs reviews.

To add to its focus on customer service, the hosting and networks company successfully launched EtherStream in the Netherlands in 2005 and last year in the UK. The service is the latest addition to Easynet's product portfolio, offering new, cost-effective Wide Area Network (WAN) access to dramatically increase the availability of world-class, resilient infrastructure services. EtherStream will drive convergence and make new applications a reality for the many thousands of businesses with branch networks or heavy e-commerce demands that may have previously been restricted to the expense of upgrading to fibre.

Enterprises with multiple locations can use EtherStream to create a multi-protocol label switching virtual private network (MPLS VPN) at European level. Any growth in bandwidth demands can also be met without costly upgrades or complicated migration processes. The service is available at 200 exchanges across the UK - reaching 60% of all UK businesses - with this set to expand significantly to provide UK-wide coverage. Easynet has signed 11 customers in the UK, including Ambassador Theatre Group.

Ambassador Theatre Group is well positioned to respond quickly to its customers' changing requirements. IT director, Vin Govender has brought the Group - owner of 24 theatres, including the historic Donmar - into the next generation of networking. The Group has introduced an innovative ticketing system, streamlining the theatres' internal systems and enabling theatregoers to manage their entire bookings online. EtherStream enables this entire new system.

Vin said: "It's essential for us to evolve with the changing needs of our customers. They need to be able to source information on plays and casts, make bookings and find theatre facilities and directions, instantaneously. Huge amounts of data are required to travel around the company to meet this need. Using EtherStream will mean that we can work collaboratively, seamlessly integrate systems to share information and enable better use of our networking expenditure." He added: "Fibre was not an option for us, due to the nature of our historic buildings. EtherStream has given us another - better - option".

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Easynet
www.easynet.com