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How self-serve kiosks are helping cash-paying utility customers

Alabama Power Company recognized the need to make payments easier for its cash-paying customers. Self-serve kiosks have proven helpful, and automatic payments have been rising.

Photo courtesy of CityBase

December 28, 2018 by Elliot Maras — Editor, Kiosk Marketplace & Vending Times

Keeping the lights on is something most Americans take for granted. But for people on a tight budget, one missed payment, and you better have the flashlight or the candles ready.

Alabama Power Company wanted to relieve the stress for customers on a tight budget. Even though the utility company has 89 business offices throughout the state, many customers do not find it easy to visit an office during working hours, and not everyone is comfortable making payments on the company's website. 

Self-serve payment kiosks that accept cash and checks have provided a convenient option.

"It gives those customers a quicker and easier way to make their payments," Terri Tucker, accounting services manager at the electric utility, told Kiosk Marketplace. "They can just walk up to the kiosk, make their payment and know that it's going to process (in) real time as if they were paying one of the cashiers. It's primarily your cash customers." 

Prior to the kiosks, there were customers waiting for the offices to open at 8 a.m. to make their payments, Tucker said. 

The company was also aware of the fact that customers in general are becoming more comfortable with self-service technology when it began introducing the self-service kiosks from CityBase in March of 2017.

Company focuses on customer convenience

Alabama Power Company's expansion into self-serve kiosks was part of a larger strategy to make payments more convenient for customers. In 2016, the company added payment stations in select retail stores, including Walmart, Walgreen, CheckFree, Western Union and Dollar General, providing customers the convenience of paying electric bills where they shop. Customers pay an extra fee at these pay stations, usually $1.50.

The retail payments proved popular with many customers, Tucker said, prompting the company to consider other ways to help cash paying customers.

The company learned about the CityBase kiosks from the Montgomery Water Works in Montgomery, Alabama, which was one of CityBase's largest early customers. Alabama Power considered several kiosk vendors before deciding to work with CityBase.

Alabama Power, unlike some users, opted to purchase the kiosks from CityBase and pay a monthly maintenance fee rather than leasing the kiosks.

High traffic locations targeted

The utility initially selected 34 offices that have the most walk-in traffic and installed the kiosks over a two-and-a-half month period, Tucker said. The 34 offices cover all geographic areas the company serves.

Later in the year, the company added some outdoor drive-up self-serve payment terminals, making a total of 79 self-serve payment kiosks at 34 offices. To offer 24/7 outdoor service, the company cut a hole in the wall. There are cameras positioned to record customer activity at the kiosks.

About 70 percent of the kiosk use is at kiosks with 24/7 access, Tucker said.

Customers can make payments with cash or check, with credit and debit payment in the works, Tucker said. When making check payments at the kiosk, the customer scans the check and enters the amount.

"It works like an ACH transaction because it's picking up the routing and the account number off of the check," she said. "We don't keep the physical check and we don't take an image of the full check."

The CityBase kiosks can give change, but Alabama Power opted not to offer this feature, Tucker said.

In introducing the kiosks, the company had employees on hand to instruct them how to use the technology.

The kiosks, like the retail pay stations, are helpful to customers who don't want to mail in check payments or wait in line to see a cashier, Tucker said. 

"If it's six or seven at night and they're getting an alert saying, ‘you've got an hour left, you need to deposit some money,' they need a way to quickly do that," she explained. "A kiosk or these authorized payment locations give them a place to go and reload."

Kiosk use increases

About 83 percent of the kiosk users are now repeat users, up from 64 percent last December. "Once the customer uses that kiosk once, they are coming back and using the kiosk the next time they make their payment," she said. 

In offices that have kiosks, 15 percent of customers choose to pay at the kiosk, Tucker said. The amount of use, however, varies. Use ranges between 4 and 30 percent, depending on the office. The offices getting the least use have less walk-in traffic.

Part two of this two-part series will explore other benefits the kiosks provide Alabama Power.
 

About Elliot Maras

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Elliot Maras is the editor of Kiosk Marketplace and Vending Times. He brings three decades covering unattended retail and commercial foodservice.