The Injustice of Misplaced Justice

Several weeks ago, I was in a supermarket and purchased a few items. When it came to change, the cashier had no coins. So what does she do? Without apology, she gave me 4 sweets (as a substitute for my 4 shillings). This kind of bartering takes place all the time in this country – some supermarkets even have a sign at the cashier’s point boldly asking customers to accept sweets as there is a shortage of coins. The shopper does not have to wait a long time as coins are being sought. The supermarket swiftly moves on to the next customer. But I thought, hang on a minute. Who is getting the short end of the stick here? I never wanted sweets in the first place. Yet, this is not bad enough when you consider the next set of facts. The following weekend I went back to the same supermarket and looked up the prices of sweets, precisely a packet of 100 sweets, the same brand. Well, it appears a pack of 100 sweets costs 40 shillings, making the unit price about 0.4 shillings. Quite unfairly, the cashier gave me a sweet for a shilling meaning I paid 150% more. So, not only do I have to take the sweets that I never wanted in the first place, but I have to take them at a price that is just scandalous! At a time of deep-recession-economy like this, such is the kind of stuff that makes my blood boil. Heck, the government had to change the way the Central Bureau of Statistics calculates inflation so that the figures can look less scary.

My beloved country is not known for consumer rights protection so I don’t think I will get justice any time soon. My recourse is to shop using Visa debit card (!), even for items of as low as 10 shillings. I think this option makes the supermarket pay a service charge to Visa and that is somewhat gratifying. However, it means I will have to spend some extra 5 minutes waiting as the cashier swipes my card over and over because of time-out errors arising from the fact that the GPRS connection for the PDQs is provided by the CSP which I work for and we are not known for reliable data connections. It is Africa after all, reliable data services equate to a luxury. The other risk is: my card may very well be cloned while I am at it. A friend of mine once swiped his card in Nigeria and later started noticing dodgy transactions on his bank statement. When he mentioned to us that he had recently been to Abuja, suddenly the dots connected.

Let’s think of some of the ways that CSPs also rob customers in exercises that are meant to make the customer’s life easier, or to correct mistakes made by the CSP.

We once had a customer whose data bundle balance was deleted. He noticed and promptly complained. He only noticed because he had been charged out-of-bundle fees and thought this cannot be right. So, he demanded proof of data sessions and volumes and it turned out his suspicions were right. In our wisdom, we refunded the bytes. We also credited back the number of bytes that had been charged out of bundle. Nobody thought about the fact that the important thing was not just the number of out-of-bundle bytes but the per unit rate at which the customer’s account had been charged i.e. his first complaint is that 50MB were deleted thus clearing his data bundle as a result of which he surfed 25MB out of bundle charged at 8 shillings per MB hence accruing a charge of 100 shillings. If he had been surfing within bundle (as he should have), the per unit rate would be 3 shillings. Quite elementary, you would think. Giving him back 75MB is simply not justice. Perhaps somebody thought the customer wouldn’t notice.

But notice he did. And complained to high-heavens, story was all over the dailies. We were “saved” by the same thing that I am now complaining about – my country is not known for consumer rights protection.

Eventually, we did refund correctly. But the customer’s faith in us, if he ever had any, was gone. Can a refund ever make up for the inconvenience?

All is Bad that Starts Badly

We were urgently summoned - Marketing wanted the product launched as soon as possible
Which product, we asked? Billing team thought the billing was not easily configurable
Where is the business case? Finance said the revenue must be reportable
Does it work? Customer Care insisted the customers must be comfortable

So we asked - can the stakeholder departments sign off on the product launch document?
Marketing became vehement
The customers are baying for the product, or they will churn
And if they do, we all burn
Pray, where is the business rules document, queried Revenue Assurance
So that we may be sure, and not leave anything to chance

Launch, we must. So said Marketing.


So we launched the product and placed the advert on centre-pages
The customers whooped with delight …And now there are revenue leakages
Revenue figures are not correct, insists Finance
Customers are complaining bitterly, so brief was the romance

The CEO says Revenue Assurance Team was too feeble
But…Marketing wanted the product launched as soon as possible

Catchment Assurance and The Bollocks Index

A few days ago, a colleague of mine attended a conference where he was introduced to a ground-breaking, revolutionary, earth-shattering and profoundly insightful concept that surpasses revenue assurance not by an incremental step but by leaps and bounds – catchment assurance. He could not wait to get back to the office and share this gem with us. Over several cups of coffee, he took us through it in detail as we sat and marveled at the genius of Homo sapiens. Well, it goes something like this: Revenue Assurance, as we know it, comes too far down the line. It assumes that there is some revenue to be assured. Catchment Assurance comes before this, up the stream if you like. It starts to look at the sources of revenue even before they generate revenue. Yes, I meant that. It is not a typo.

A few questions:

What is a revenue catchment? Is it in terms of new subscribers, existing subscribers who are not giving the CSP as much revenue as they should/could (and who is to say), the subscribers who are with your competitor(s)? Is it products which are yet to be rolled out or existing products which are yet to be enhanced? Does it pertain to subscribers who have unresolved complaints and who are at risk of reducing their ARPU as a result of dissatisfaction? Is it areas where a CSP does not have network coverage or has poor coverage leading to poor call completion rate? Is it a restatement of churn monitoring? If you are in a market where Mobile Number Portability service is active, what is the size of your catchment? How do we measure how well catchment assurance is being done?

Do I smell a whiff of cow-dung here? When he first told me about it, I could not help but giggle, but then I decided to take it through what I call the “Bollocks test”.

The Bollocks Test (BT) was not invented by BT although some of BT’s ideas have been taken through the Bollocks Test and found to be wanting (but that is a post for another day). For the benefit of those who are not familiar with Bollocks Test, it was actually invented by none other than yours truly and is reputed to be one of mankind’s greatest inventions. It has been nominated several times for a Nobel but those morons experts at the awards committee cannot stand the truth especially when it comes from somebody younger than them, hence they have studiously ignored it for the last 35 years. The motivation for inventing BT was as a result of sitting through conferences and meetings where people would come up with the “Next Big Idea” and invariably it would be something that is not practical/not cost-effective/very fuzzy/a restatement of something that has been done before.
BT enables the listener of a new big idea to pluck real ideas from the bollocks galore clothed in snazzy presentations.

BT has been applied to all manner of situations and has worked in all instances. It says, given a new concept apply several questions on it:

• STEP 1: Start with a default Bollocks value of 100%. Everything is bollocks until proven otherwise.

• STEP 2: Is it practical? Note, practical does not necessarily mean it has been done before. It may be a new concept that is practical. The fact that we did not know how to do something does not mean it cannot be done or it is not practical. Is it realistic? If something passes this test, new bollocks value is default bollocks value (100%) minus 25%. Else retain bollocks value of STEP 1.

• STEP 3: If it is practical, is it cost-effective? The fact that it has been done before or can be done does not mean it should be done. Cost here does not relate to money alone. It is really a basic question of: is it worth it? If it passes this step, subtract 25% from the final bollocks value in STEP2. Else retain bollocks value of STEP2.

• STEP 4: Are the parameters and scope clearly defined or is it open to any individual’s interpretation and lends itself to a style of changes on the fly? Think of it this way, would you be willing to purchase a cup of coffee from a restaurant that is known to make it sometimes using fresh water, sometimes using salty-water, sometimes using coca cola? If it passes this step, subtract 25% from the final bollocks value in STEP3. Else retain bollocks value of STEP 3

• STEP 5: Is it a new concept or a re-statement of something that is already happening? If it passes this step, subtract 25% from the final bollocks value in STEP3. Else retain bollocks value of STEP 4.

Homework for the reader:

Apply the bollocks test to the concept of catchment assurance. This assignment contributes 0% to your RA career and will not be graded.

Waiting for the President

Having gone through the GRAPA site, I decided to get some information from this organization.

First Email to info@grapatel.com (10-SEP-2010)

Hi,

I am new in the RA world and just learnt about GRAPA. I have a few questions having gone through the GRAPA site and a copy of the RA Standards 2009 that a friend of mine was kind enough to share with me.

I have a few queries before I decide whether to join GRAPA and would be glad if you can provide some answers:

If you have a copy of the GRAPA constitution (or any other suitable document that explains the workings and organization of GRAPA), please share this as I suspect it will go a long way in answering some of the questions below.

Running of GRAPA: What roles/responsibilities exist? I know from the GRAPA site that Rob Mattison is the president but what other roles/officials exist in the management of GRAPA? For example, I noted Chris Yesulis features on the standards ratification process. Are officials nominated (by whom) or elected (what’s the election process)?

What is the set term for officials to serve GRAPA? Is there a limit to the number of terms an official can serve? If there is such a limit, how often are they replaced?

How do regional GRAPA chairpersons come into being?

With regard to the process of revision of standards, the GRAPA site states: In September/October of each year, a "review committee" is established. It is the job of this committee to review organization and make recommendations for standards modification based upon the petitions and proposals. How is the review committee set up i.e. election, nomination etc? What are the qualifications of a person serving on such a committee? I have gone through the standards handbook and did not get this information.

Given that there is no membership fee, how are GRAPA operations funded?

How is financial oversight carried out?

Concerning the training curriculum, how is this governed i.e. what is the development process for the courses that GRAPA offers, along with quality assurance checks that are attendant to this process?

Town halls: is there quorum requirement for a town hall? The total number of town halls I could find archived on the GRAPA site is about 10 - is this all?

With regard to the RA standards, which I understand are the results a consultative process involving many RA professionals, I would imagine the copyright would be in the name of GRAPA and not an individual (Rob Mattison)? Or what is the rationale behind this arrangement?

Please expound on the continuing professional education (CPE) process of GRAPA.

No response.

So I drafted a second email (this time to dustin@grapatel.com) 13-SEP-2010

Dear Dustin,

I picked your email address from an old newsletter where you are listed Memberships Manager:

http://www.grapatel.com/A-GRAPA/07-Library/newsletters/newsletter0308.htm

Would you be in a position to assist me with answers regarding the questions I have listed below? I have not received any response yet from info@grapatel.com

As expected, no response

Third email (to the collective email address, I imagine, grapateam@gmail.com) 14-SEP-2010

Hi GRAPA Team,

I am looking for the information below but I suspect there is a problem delivering email. Please review and get back to me when you can.

No response, hence I took the liberty to write to the President of GRAPA himself. 17-SEP-2010. Imagine me, mere mortal, writing to the President of a Global Association. I must admit, I felt intimidated. I was standing on hallowed ground, approaching the throne with trepidation and awe. History was being made here, my friends, and I was part of it. Precedence was being set, really. From this point on, anything could happen. I was acutely aware that by this single act, I could book my place in the annals of history and this is a prospect that was both exhilarating and daunting at the same time! I had deigned to write to a President who governs not just the United States of America but all RA professionals scattered across the globe, from Timbuktu to Tasmania, from Oslo to Ohio and from [wherever you, dear reader are] to [where I am].... But I took courage and typed a few words, taking care to be as reverent as possible lest I bring upon myself the wrath of His Excellency (His Majesty? His Worship?).  I mean, this right here, is what my mother had always warned me about - never to question elders.

Dear Rob,

I hope you are well. I am seeking some info regarding GRAPA and have not been lucky with my enquiries so far. Would you mind sharing some of the info requested below?

Lo and behold, I receive a response from Rob Mattison on 18-SEP-2010. Thus spaketh the President:

I  have seen your emails.

What exactly do you want to know and why? We have never had anyone ask these questions, so I would like to know who you are and why you are asking.

Membership is free, and joining GRAPA does not bind you in any way, so forgive me if I am confused.

Please provide us with a contact phone number, and a non-gmail email account and we will be happy to contact you.

And I responded on 22-SEP-2010:

Rob,

Many thanks for the reply. The reason I ask these questions is I can't find the information on the GRAPA site or on the RA standards handbook. Hence I imagined there may be some information that I am not privy to and that would be available upon request. I believe for a global professionals organization, these are and should be valid question for anybody contemplating membership, as I am.

My understanding is that a member would have certain obligations to the professional body and likewise, the professional body has certain obligations which I have enquired about below e.g. how curriculum is developed and quality assurance that goes into it, how financial oversight is maintained, how officials come into being and what durations they serve, the rigor of the CPE process, why copyright for RA standards copyright is in the name of an individual if in deed it was a collective process of ratification...in my view these are basic questions.

Even if GRAPA membership would not bind me in any way(which is strange, I would expect at least some code of conduct which as a professional I subscribe to), I am keen to understand how it works. However, I am reachable on my number +XXX XXX XXX XXX.

No response, so far. However, I am patiently waiting for the President. For I know he must be busy. Is he wont to tarry? Nobody knows...this much I know, his calendar is not one I could manage. After all, this is a global association we are talking about here.

RA Toons

*Inspired by a post I read on Revenue Protect. Unfortunately I am unable to post the exact html link of the post as the search feature on the blog seems to have a problem. [Update...actually here it is.]

**As much as this post makes use of the pronoun “He”, the culprits are to be found among both male and female members of the homo sapiens species. The female reader is thus advised to wipe that smirk off her face

***This post contains stereotypes. It is not meant to educate. No apologies are made for this unfortunate state of affairs.

Robotic Richard

This guy will finish the review, issue the report highlighting the variances that are beyond the set tolerance. At that point, his work is done. Follow-up will not be done and there will be no understanding of the root cause. He will repeat the same reconciliation day in day out without ever pausing to think: is there a better, faster more efficient way to do it, could I be missing something, is there any value in repeating this. Come performance appraisal time and the kind of responses he will give are: “I conducted 69 switch-to-bill reconciliations and issued a report for each one of them. The reports were double-spaced, used Times Roman Font number 12 and were sent in MS-Word and PDF. They were filed on the RA folder and color-coded using blue for minor issues, yellow for serious issues and red for critical issues. None of the reports had any speling [sic] error.”

Clean-hands Clark

Believes RA is a walk-in walk-out affair. Go in to the operations team, get the data, analyze, pick out the issues and send out report. As opposed to the character above, this one will figure out better, faster and different ways of picking issues but will never be bothered as to how the resolution is done preferring to exit the scene as soon as possible. Should the operations team require his help in further analysis (owing to his prowess in data analysis, process reviews, etc), he will barely acknowledge the request as he will be too busy looking out for the next problem. He is driven by fear that if he participates in fixing issues and the corrective actions fail, he will be in the same bandwagon with the losers from operations.

Clue-less Leslie

Is in revenue assurance but has no clue. He will not make an effort to learn because it does not matter to him where he is. Some of the reports from this guy may contain hilarious statements such as “We did not reconcile usage against the billing platform because this was out of scope for this review” or “Operations team assured us that they had already tested this service hence there was no need for us to test” or “Marketing team wishes to launch this service ASAP. We shall review after launch” or “We recommend that over-charged subscribers complain to our Customer Care team” or “There was no revenue leakage as we ascertained that the billing platforms had more CDRs than the switch.”

Happy-go-lucky Herbert

Quick to start new reviews but never completes them. Gets very easily distracted (classic case of attention deficit disorder). If this guy tells you that a particular area has been reviewed and there was no problem, be afraid. Be very afraid. If you are his manager, read every report, then re-read it, then re-execute the procedure or have somebody else do it. Whatever you delegate to Herbert is as good as not done.

Bored Benson

Benson is always on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter and LinkedIn. He figures the leakage is not so serious, after all the company is still profitable. He will suddenly become very animated on Friday afternoon, especially if the team is meeting for some drinks after-hours. Benson is truly in RA mode – no, not Revenue Assurance, I meant Remote Agent.

Raging Robert

Robert is an excellent RA analyst but lacks emotional intelligence. He suffers from an unquenchable need to see somebody take the fall, will always be eager to apportion blame and due to this attitude, operational teams will simply not cooperate or will only cooperate when they have no alternative (usually because the CEO has said they must or heads will roll). This kind of guy is one of the heaviest liabilities the RA department can carry and whatever gains the rest of the team makes, he is sure to reverse them with one email or one phone call or simply an encounter in the elevator. Probably had a difficult childhood and has a harsh spouse and two errant teenagers.

Meticulous Marvin

Marvin is too thorough. He thinks of all scenarios and tests each one of them. He is so careful that before he types a report, he will first write it down using a blue pen, then a red pen and finally a black pen. He then types up the report, prints a copy, proof reads it and makes corrections. He will then share the report with Happy-go-lucky Herbert for peer review and Herbert will promptly state that the report is good to go. Then the report will be shared with Bored Benson, Raging Robert, Robotic Richard….by the time it is ready for issue and discussion with the operations team, somebody else will have discovered the issue, identified the root cause and fixed it. Meticulous Marvin will now take his report, initial every page, laminate it and file in triplicate.

Wolves Teaching Lambs at the Waterfront

"Go your ways: behold, I send you forth as lambs among wolves"

Jesus was speaking to his followers and warning them that their sojourn would be no walk in the park.

The telco revenue assurance world is also no walk in the park.

There are shadowy characters in the form of unscrupulous consultants, vendors who can sell you solutions that you already have and plain old scoundrels/charlatans/comedians/bandits/snake-oil salesmen who travel the world successfully packaging and selling bull-crap all in the name of RA. Rob Mattison is top of this. For some time, I have been a follower of Eric Priezkaln’s RA blogs first on revenue protect and later on TalkRA and a number of his posts point out on the wolf-nature of Rob and his GRAPA cult. At one point, I had the feeling that possibly Eric and Rob have some old rivalry that spans generations (maybe one took the other’s damsel) and that Eric was simply spewing bile…until I attended a training conducted by Rob. Apart from rehashing old material, playing internet humor video clips, there really was no RA knowledge to write home about. And that is all fine. I thought I must be some sort of genius. Suffice it to say that 0.5 of what we leant can be googled and the other 0.3 is good old common sense and 0.2 is from Rob’s opinions. The PowerPoint slides are however printed and bound in shiny material so I suppose the company should pay for that. Perhaps Rob is not to blame – I wonder whether one can really teach RA especially when you stopped working for telcos before the turn of the millenium. Of the much I have learnt in about 4 years of my very long career (!), I am not ashamed to admit that there was lots of trial and error. Occasionally, there was some good material from RA blogs, TMF standards etc but the bulk of what I know (or what I like to think I know) has come from listening and questioning people who do RA and a little bit of sparring with those who are in other functions in the company (Billing, Marketing, Operations and so on). Occasionally you run into thinkers like Tony Poulos at a conference and you get to appreciate different viewpoints. There are also a number of very experienced-no-BS-real-RA-practitioner types who engage in debate at TalkRA and I think I learn more every time I pass by. Actually, the exciting part is that I get a better insight into how little I knew despite the much I thought I knew… But I digress.

What is even more worrying is that I got a certificate proving that I had passed the course. What course?

From that point, I decided to keep the GRAPA emails which hit my mail box every now and then, just for fun and I have collected quite a number of training invitations. Every time I am bored, I pull up a few and I get really tickled. I sample them here for the reader to decide which ones would be worth attending. I hasten to add that should you attend:

i) I guarantee you will pass

ii) You will be thoroughly entertained with stories of Rob’s travel around the world and he will also share his huge library of internet fun clips, complete with sound and in HD.

iii) You will get a certificate…and a photo with Rob himself. Can this deal get better?

Here goes the menu, hot from my GRAPA_BS folder.

Cape Town - GRAPA Training Near the Waterfront!

This one really caught my attention. I can imagine presenting my boss with the brochure declaring that for a few days, I will be at the waterfront learning how to do better RA. His expression would be priceless: So, waterfront, eh? And I would respond without even paraphrasing one of the sentences from the brochure: Revenue Assurance and Fraud Training does not have to be all business!

Roaming Assurance / Convergent Billing 2-Day Training -Cape Town

There must be something about Cape Town. Really.

Cape Town - Focused RA Training - Choose Your Topic!

In deed, choose your topic. Remember the three guarantees I gave above? They still apply. Now I must go to Cape Town.

Cut RA Costs, Improve Effectiveness - RA Overview Crash Course

One way of cutting RA costs is by attending meaningful trainings but hey, that’s bean-counter talk - don’t let it get in the way now.

Advanced Telecoms Fraud Certification Training - 1 Week

Advanced is the key word here. Is it the training that is advanced or the fraud that is highly complex? Come and find out.

Earn Masters-Level RA Certification - 2 Week Training!

And get shiny certificate while you are at it. Fancy being a Certified Revenue Assurance Professional (CRAP).

Hardcore Fraud: 1-2 Day Crash Courses

You can attend 1 day or 2 days. Either way, please wire your payments ahead of the training.

RA2020: All-New Revenue Assurance Certification Training

Oh, so you want RA1010? We also have that. We shall cover it over dinner.

3G, GPRS and Internet Assurance/M-Banking 1-Day Crash Course

Don’t be fooled by the title. We shall cover more than 3G. LTE assurance will be taught.

Telco Profit Master Class - Johannesburg

This is for gurus. If you are a small fish, stay away. No, don’t stay away - just come and by the time you leave, you will be a Profit Master.

GRAPA Lagos RA/Fraud Training Mar 2010 - Last Chance

Training is conducted by holders of the Certified Nigerian Fraudster (CNF) designation.

Lagos Xtreme Revenue Assurance Event: RA Job Security and Growth

Feeling insecure? Come to this one. We shall have group therapy sessions and even a masseuse.

Others:

>New Telco Accounting Fraud Crash Course

>Telecoms Fraud Masters Level Certification Training Events

>Is Your Telco at Risk for Fraud? 1-Week Certification Event

>India Xtreme RA Event: Next Generation Revenue Assurance Training

>SIMbox & Interconnect Fraud Prevention Masterclass - Cape Town

>Revenue Maximization: 2-Day Training in Cape Town Only!