Customer-centric organization achieves 40% efficiency boost while gaining control and measurability as a result of LegaSuite® business process optimization project

ATLANTA, DORDRECHT, The Netherlands– 5 September 2006 – Seagull Software (AEX: SEAGULL), a leading provider of high-performance software solutions that transform legacy business applications into service-oriented architecture (SOA) assets, announced the successful completion of a business process optimization project with Hydron - a Dutch water utility company.

Hydron supplies water to several municipalities throughout the Netherlands with its primary business being extraction, production and delivery of fresh, pure drinking water to over 1.5 million people and thousands of companies. Using LegaSuite, a workflow-driven customer care portal was created and integrated with complex applications such as those for accounts receivable. LegaSuite works behind the scenes to integrate with these applications and automates time-consuming manual and paper processes including interactions with the complicated legacy customer information system that is utilized by customer care agents.

“The added value is in bringing the customer and the agent closer together,” said Leo Hendriks, Hydron Deputy Director and Customer Care Manager. “Our customer care agents have discovered that they can assist customers more quickly which means the customer is happier, and each agent can help more customers each day. We’re quite proud of the results we've achieved,” added Hendriks.

Hydron realized they needed to lower costs while improving and standardizing seventy processes to meet their growing business demands. Agents were spending too much time interacting with the complex customer information system, which meant they had less time to help customers. To solve these problems, Hydron decided to gain more control and measurability over their workflow by simplifying their processes and implementing an advanced but easy-to-use portal application which would guide agents through each process quickly, reduce or eliminate manual steps and prevent mistakes.

The new and improved portal was implemented without disrupting existing operations and has yielded the following results:

 Average time to complete a customer interaction has decreased by 40%. Customers appreciate the efficiency, and agents are able to service more customers per day.
 Some processes were reduced by a few minutes, while more complex processes decreased from as much as two hours to five minutes
 The new application is vastly simpler to learn and use, reducing the 3-month training time significantly, preventing mistakes and increasing agent job satisfaction.
 Improved agent productivity means reduced requirement for additional staff.

“Hydron’s business process optimization project has been a great success, and it’s a perfect example of the effectiveness of IT asset re-use,” commented Seagull Software Senior Vice President of European Operations Wico van Helden. “Hydron used LegaSuite to build upon existing IT assets to achieve significant improvements in cycle time and customer satisfaction. This approach is cost effective and fast, and preserves all of the important intellectual capital and reliability embedded in existing systems.”
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About Hydron
Hydron is a Dutch drinking water company which supplies drinking water to several municipalities throughout the Netherlands. Its primary business is the extraction, production and delivery of fresh, pure drinking water to over 1.5 million people and thousands of companies.