By ; Nahla Muqalad
Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) launched the Smart Response Service in July 2019. This is part of its vision as a globally leading sustainable innovative corporation and its strategy, which is based on enhancing innovation and making it a cornerstone of its operations, and efforts to enhance customer happiness.
The Smart Response Service has several features such as self-diagnosis of interruptions, reducing steps to deal with complaints from 10 to 6 steps by DEWA and only 1 step for the customers if they can diagnose the status by themselves. The service also reduces the tracking time. It finds the best solutions to deal with, follow up and resolve technical notifications in a simpler and easier way, using DEWA's smart app and website. It provides value-added service through notifications when water consumption increases, enhancing customer experience and service efficiency.
Significant achievements since its launch
HE Saeed Mohammed Al Tayer, MD & CEO of DEWA, stressed DEWA’s commitment to engage with society members in concerted efforts to protect the environment, preserve natural resources, and encourage different sectors to adopt a conscious and responsible lifestyle to promote sustainable development in Dubai. This supports the Dubai Clean Energy Strategy 2050 to make Dubai the city with the lowest carbon footprint in the world by 2050, the Demand Side Management Strategy to reduce electricity and water use by 30% by 2030, and DEWA’s vision to become a globally leading sustainable innovative corporation. He also commended the great response from customers who benefit from these features. “DEWA depends on innovation and the latest disruptive technologies to provide water and electricity services at the highest standards of availability, reliability, and efficiency, and to achieve the Demand Side Management Strategy to reduce energy and water use by 30% by 2030. DEWA is committed to launching innovative initiatives to provide value-added services to our customers that make their lives easier and contribute to transforming Dubai into the smartest and happiest city in the world. This supports the vision of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, to improve government services to achieve society’s happiness, and the Dubai Plan 2021, to make Dubai the preferred place to live, work, and visit,” said Al Tayer.
Al Tayer pointed to DEWA’s ongoing work to develop its services by improving its efficiency through innovation to strengthen Dubai’s position as a global hub for excellence and innovation. DEWA also collaborates with several government organisations to implement improvements within the framework of unified government services, for happier customers and to exceed their expectations. DEWA is committed to providing uninterrupted and stable electricity and water supply for all residents of Dubai, to ensure their comfortespecially in terms of securing their power and water needs around the clock,” added Al Tayer.
“The Smart Response service for technical notification is one of DEWA’s services to enrich the user’s experience, as it saves their time and efforts and achieve their happiness, using AI. DEWA has become a reference for best practices in customer happiness and service excellence. DEWA’s innovation team is keen to identify initiatives that will achieve customer happiness by relying on innovative tools to understand and analyse their needs and expectations by engaging them in questionnaires and focus groups. We study response reports as well as access global best practices and lessons learned from innovation camps and experience surveys, in line with the standards of ‘Dubai The Model (DTM) Centre’ for Service Improvement. The service is developed based on three major fields: raising awareness among customers through using interactive pre-interaction with them, redesign the customer’s journey in an integrated and innovative way, and exceeding work field at DEWA and provide special maintenance services through active partnerships with private sector,” said Marwan Bin Haidar, Executive Vice President of Innovation and the Future at DEWA.
91% customer happiness with the service
Customers happiness with the service has reached 91%. This is a result of the service’s success to enhance their experience, save their time and efforts, and make them happy. The service reduced the time needed to fix interruptions by 43%. Abdel Manaam Mohammed Ahmed, an Emirati citizen expressed his gratitude to DEWA and said, “This provides self-diagnosis of technical interruptions and reduces the steps to resolve complaints and follow-up on them through its smart app and website. This is in addition to the quick response and accuracy of diagnosis which enables us as customers to know what to do. This saves our time, efforts, and money and makes us proud of the development and innovation of DEWA.
The Smart Response Service reduces the time needed to fix interruptions by 43%. It also enables customers to do self-diagnosis for the interruption of service, and get familiar with the necessary precautions to ensure continuity and quality of water supply. Some 56% of customers were able to resolve these issues on their own, thanks to the Smart Response Service. In case the interruption was internal, DEWA provides trustworthy maintenance companies on DEWA Store to fix the interruption swiftly and efficiently. This enhances our partnerships, especially with the private sector.
Innovative and simple service
DEWA designed the Smart Response Service in an innovative and simple way that meets the needs and capabilities of all customers. This enables them to report water interruptions and follow up and resolve it in one click using AI. Customers can report the interruption in several languages through DEWA’s smart app or the website. Riyaz Ahmed, Group Finance Manager at Power Group of Companies, thanked DEWA saying, “It saves time, money, and effort for companies. This kind of smart and swift service attracts investments in Dubai. DEWA is a role model in customer service and reassures businesses. The service highlights the development and innovation in the country that hosts their businesses. It is the best market to attract many business opportunities.”
Raising awareness on the needed procedures to ensure the continuity of service
DEWA launched a campaign for its customers to learn about the steps of this service and recommends that all customers follow its specifications to ensure the availability of electricity. It also encourages them to understand the steps required to benefit from the Smart Response Service during water and electricity interruptions. In case of power cuts, DEWA advises customers to identify the affected areas and inspect the internal distribution board. If a circuit breaker is disconnected, a qualified technician may be assigned to help. If all the breakers are on, customers can follow the steps on the Smart Response Service on DEWA’s smart app. DEWA recommends that all water tanks and internal connections be in accordance with its specifications including water tank capacity of at least 24 hours. These should be regularly maintained to prevent blockages.
DEWA advises against using additional booster pumps, other than the mainline booster pump, as this can lead to meter defects. If there are still water interruptions, customers should verify if the booster pump is working and also check the main source of water into the building, in case it has been shut off, for maintenance or other reasons. Customers can follow the steps for reporting and resolving the problem. For water interruption, please use the link https://youtu.be/RBU-t2rswng
For electricity interruption, please use the link https://youtu.be/7GkpnBftabM
High Water Usage Alert
The High-Water Usage Alert initiative helps customers discover possible leaks in their water connections, after the meter. The system sends instant notifications to the customer if there is an unusual increase in consumption, to check the internal connections and repair any leaks with the help of a specialised technician. This contributes to reducing incurred costs by limiting water wastage. The initiative reduces the ‘Recovery Average Time’ goal of minor notifications from 3 hours to 2 hours, and the major notifications from 6 hours to 4 hours. DEWA has successfully built an advanced smart water meter infrastructure and relied on AI and a strategy to develop pre-solutions, to reduce leakage and avoid unnecessary bills and damage to their property. DEWA alerts customers of increased consumption within 2 days, compared to 29 days previously. After benchmarking smart meters in the USA, DEWA now provides faster notification services to customers free of charge, unlike other entities.
