At the same time, postpaid plans are increasingly adding prepaid-style features. Sometimes called “hybrid" plans, these offerings provide more flexibility not just for consumers and business users, but also for mobile operators and their business partners.
For example, one Brazilian operator offers a postpaid account with a credit limit and prepaid-style top-ups.
Unprecedented Flexibility
To support hybrid plans and enable a wider range of promotions for prepaid and postpaid customers alike, mobile operators in CALA and other world regions are upgrading their back offices with real-time charging platforms. Unlike rigid legacy platforms, real-time charging solutions are far more capable of supporting the wide range of services enabled by 2.5G, 3G, fixed-mobile convergence and quadruple plays.
Real-time charging platforms make it easier and faster for mobile operators to develop and launch promotions and other offers that drive additional revenue, minimize churn and attract customers. Some real-world examples include:
- Per-second voice billing or per-character SMS charging to differentiate against rivals with legacy platforms that can’t adapt to match these offers. Charging by the character or second also can be an effective way to target highly price-sensitive consumers.
- Loyalty programs, where customers can earn points for using certain services that are then redeemed from the operator, as payment for a new phone for example, or from a business partner, such as for concert tickets. This example illustrates the importance of a real-time platform since it allows customers to get rewards almost immediately rather than days or weeks later. This immediacy encourages usage because the customer can recognize the benefits as soon as they are earned.
- In Brazil, Oi’s Voice virtual private network (VPN) service for the enterprise market is available on both a prepaid and postpaid basis, and it works across multiple networks, including mobile, VoIP and circuit-switched wireline.
- In the U.S., hybrid family plans where parents pay for their teenagers’ postpaid voice plan, while the teens have an add-on prepaid “bucket" that they fund themselves for services such as text messaging, ringtones and apps. This offering can be effective for targeting price-sensitive parents who otherwise wouldn’t consider providing their children with a phone.
- In the U.K., hybrid business plans where a company provides employees with a phone that they can take home after work for personal use. During business hours, the employer-paid postpaid plan covers calls and data services, but on evenings and weekends, usage is deducted from the employee’s prepaid plan. This type of hybrid plan can be attractive to companies that want to use mobile phones as a perk to help attract and retain employees.
Putting Customers in Control
The global, industry-wide trend toward real-time charging ultimately is about one thing: control.
For operators, that means greater control over the types of plans and promotions they can offer. For customers, real-time charging means more control over their wireless spending and services.
For parents and employers, that can mean the ability to set spending limits or restrict access to certain services, such as no text messaging during school hours.
Control also can encourage or increase use of services, even among price-sensitive customers or those on a limited budget, because there’s less risk of being surprised by a big bill. For example, with a real-time charging platform, an operator could provide outbound and inbound roamers with alerts when they’re approaching customer-set spending thresholds.
When assessing their real-time charging options, CALA operators should keep an eye on the TM Forum, which has several working groups in areas such as:
- Revenue management, including defining the processes, data and applications that are used in charging and billing
- Value chains, including the interactions with business partners in the new world of delivering content and services
- Service delivery, including defining the operational aspects of Service Delivery Platforms
- Application, including how charging and billing can be implemented in operators’ networks
All of these industry initiatives, along with successful real-world deployments, point to a bright future for mobile services based on real-time charging. It’s an opportunity that few operators and customers can afford to pass up.
Luis Castillejos Ordaz is a regional vice president for sales and service delivery solutions at Telcordia.
