Data breaches are in the news on an almost daily basis and telecom companies are not immune to attack – indeed, cyber-attacks have led to the loss of almost 50 million customer records in the past 10 years. For telecom businesses it’s not only the frequency and number of records that are breached that is of concern, it’s also the type of data that can be lost. Telecom companies are guardians of a rich set of customer data, including financial information. They also hold a valuable set of behavioural data about their customers based on how they use their services. This rich data set is a honey pot for cybercriminals – particularly those using data to fuel identity theft. We included telecommunications providers in the cybersecurity survey carried out on our behalf by independent research company Ovum. What did we find? A full assessment of our findings for the Telco industry... [Read More]
My telecommunications service provider put me through two hours of customer service hell when I was upgrading my set-top box. What should have been a simple plug-and-play switchover turned into an arduous journey through various customer service units. At no stage did I get the impression that there was a central location for my data, as I had to repeat my address and account details several times and rerun security checks across automated and human channels. This kind of friction in the customer experience is all too common, no matter what your spend with the provider. It is little surprise that UK service providers’ churn rates for multi-play packages can be up to 20% per year, with the cost to recruit a customer approximately £300 to £400. Compare that experience to digital-first companies like Amazon and Apple, which have remarkable stickiness and growth, where the experience is frictionless and most... [Read More]
In the era of Big Data, so-called alternative data holds a special promise — to shine a new light on consumer behavior. When it comes to credit scoring, alternative data means data not being used today for risk assessment, and specifically data not found in the credit bureaus. Lenders hope scoring this data could allow them to make faster, better decisions on people who don’t have FICO® Scores — the “unscorables” with sparse or no credit bureau data on file. Hoping to jump on the alt-data bandwagon, the three main US credit reporting agencies – through their VantageScore business – have been claiming that their score uses alternative data to score more consumers than the industry-leading FICO® Score. It sounds good, but is it true? Claim: VantageScore leverages alternative data to score millions more consumers than FICO Scores. Truth: The “alternative” data VantageScore uses is utilities and cell phone bills... [Read More]
