In today’s time, telecom industry is going through one transition after another. 5G launch and IoT’s mass employment has made telecom functions very complex. But they can be streamlined well if you have a convergent charging platform that offers real-time performance.
Important Functions of Convergent Charging and How it Helps
Whether you are MVNO, MVNE or MNO, a convergent charging platform is essential for proper billing and charging. It performs many essential functions such as:
Real-time performance of online charging system ensures quick service monetization, which allows you to bring your services quickly into the market before your competitors.
An OCS is very accurate in terms of calculation of charges, which is very important in terms of revenue assurance. Customers get exactly what they have paid for, which allows you to build trust and reliability within your customer base
MVNO (Mobile Virtual Network Operator) is an essential player in the telecom domain. It serves people who are unable or don’t want to get their services from MNO (Mobile Network Operator). MVNO capture the market share that is untapped by major MNOs in the region. As many people find MNO services not in line with their vision or too expensive, they switch to MVNO. However, the MVNO domain is very competitive and one needs to be excellent in customer-facing tasks to achieve success. Convergent charging bolsters the billing performance, and hence, becomes essential for successful MVNO operations.
Make Your Weaknesses Your Strengths
convergent charging
The biggest weakness of an MVNO is their inability to source Radio Access Network (RAN). Even the biggest MVNO players do not have the finances to acquire RAN from regulatory bodies. Hence, they broker a deal via MVNE and MVNA, which source the RAN from MNO and distribute it amongst their partnering MVNOs.
MVNOs have a limited subscriber base, which can be thought of as their weakness. But it can be turned into success, if you can successfully keep your customers happy and acquire new customers with time. To achieve that, one has to be very good with their sales and marketing strategies, which involves monetization and billing.
Packaging Services in an Attractive Manner
Due to their small size and niche-based services, MVNOs have an opportunity to exploit its small subscriber base. They can serve a loyal customer demographic and gradually expand their service catalogue to offer a multitude of telecom services.
The success mantra for an MVNO is to show versatility in limitation. An intuitive telecom platform that allows you to mix and match different services, offer discounts and create interesting packages is nothing less than a godsend.
MVNOs can constantly evolve their services, but it needs to be done with customer preferences in mind. The AI-powered modern billing systems can find useful insights about customer behavior, which can point you in the right direction. An MVNO can create specific packages for video-streaming lovers, gamers, low-cost users etc. But to do that, effective convergent charging is the minimum requirement.
Bolster Business with Convergent Charging Solutions
A real-time convergent charging solution like OCS is very accurate. It can charge both event- and session-based services. As a result, MVNOs are able to send a single consolidated invoice to the customers, which bring in transparency into billing. Also, a convergent charging system is highly accurate and guarantees revenue assurance. Consequently, it allows MVNOs to build trust and forge better bonds with its customers.
Summary
Convergent charging is the key to success for a modern-day MVNO. It allows MVNOs to package their services in an orderly and attractive manner, thus making the process of gaining customer trust easy. Also, it allows for the creation of a single invoice for all services, which is cherished by today’s telecom services users.
Billing and charging are both critical aspects of modern-day telecom operations. In order to thrive in today’s market, you need the best billing platform that can offer complete transparency and keep customers on board.
Meet Requirements in Real-Time with Online Charging System
An Online Charging System (OCS) is a type of convergent charging system that caters to the unique needs of businesses. It has the capacity to store large amount of data, and the processing power to charge every service in real-time i.e., <5ms.
Due to the fast speed of service charging, it becomes possible to charge and rate both event- and session-based services at the same time. Telecom operators can now collate every service charge on a single document. This provides complete convenience and comfort to the customers using multiple services from an operator.
Another important facet of OCS is its ability to offer credit control and real-time notifications. Customers get immediate notifications when they are just about to exceed their allotted quota of data limit or call minutes. Hence, they never really have to pay anything extra, unless they actually want to go over the limit to use additional services.
The OCS allows for quick monetization and telcos are easily able to bundle different services as per their marketing strategy. It offers complete revenue assurance and comes with bolstered data security.
They don’t even know the possibilities of convergent charging and what it can offer, which is a shame because it can make a huge difference.
Apart from the basic functionalities it offers, an OCS needs to offer these features for it to be considered an asset for your MVNO:
• It should have analytics to make sense of user consumption details, their preference, buying patterns, subscribed services etc. With an AI-powered OCS, you can make better business decisions and improve your MVNO’s functions. • Reporting is also very important as it allows you to monitor customer behavior • A 3GPP compliant OCS is a must have in 2021 as it provides better security and complete revenue assurance
Summary
A convergent charging system like OCS can really change the game for an MVNO. With its ability to charge and rate services in real-time, it allows for consolidated billing. An OCS also allows for complete revenue assurance, which is necessary for winning customer trust. Integrated with analytics, an OCS can provide better insights that can be readily used by MVNOs for business benefits.
In these times of complex business setups, telecom industry is also evolving rapidly. Diameter control system specifies many core telecom functions. A top billing system has a quality charging system at its heart, which is excellent at credit control. A quality OCS allows you to monetize services quickly and stay transparent in your day-to-day billing. As a result, the quality of billing improves and even small telcos are able to compete with major players in the market when they have the right OCS system.
Charging System
Stay ahead of competing MVNOs and MNOs by leveraging the best charging system that implements accurate diameter control. Monetize services fast and enforce credit limits consistently by using Online Charging System.
MVNOs are an integral part of telecom industry. The developed world has been using the MVNO model for a long time, but it is now the right time for MVNOs in the developing world to come to the fore. By leveraging a powerful Online Charging System, MVNOs can easily perform their day-to-day billing and charging tasks. It can help them monetize services better and serve the different segments of market including the financially weaker customer groups.
Not all MVNOs are tech-savvy and have the necessary resources to match up to the telecom giants. This is why they need support from different vendors, in order to grow across multiple verticals. Be it traditional calling and SMS services, or futuristic IoT and 5G services, MVNOs need a versatile platform to get the job done. A versatile telecom charging system that can help them monetize both present and future services is the minimum requirement.
Extend Outreach by Delivering What your Subscribers Want
An MVNO depends on MNO, MVNE and MVNA for a lot of its day-to-day functions. The only thing that it really needs to do well to keep its customers satisfied is perform attractive monetization and deliver its services flawlessly. With a convergent charging and billing platform, it can be done.
Benefits of Versatile convergent Charging and Billing Telecom System
With a versatile Online Charging System, it is possible for MVNOs to monetize their strategies quicker. In the MVNO race, the first operator with the most attractive plans always wins. So, an OCS becomes absolutely critical.
A Telecom Charging System empowered by an OCS can help you in:
Single-point billing for diverse services
Revenue assurance
Reconciliation in case of disputes
Scalability
Launching attractive discounts
At Online Charging System, we provide a revolutionary charging solution that is capable of handling millions of transactions every day. Our platform is backed by a dependable customer care that can be contacted 24x7x365.
If your MNVO wants to have any chance of success, you need to have an excellent OCS to charge your customers accurately and regularly.
One of the biggest hurdles that MNVO’s face is the fact that they are constantly having to prove their worth. People are still used to working with bigger telecom companies and might be suspicious of an MNVO. Those of us who operate in the space understand that MNVOs are the wave of the future, but some of your customers are still skeptical. That’s why it’s so important to make sure that your billing is on point. Otherwise, you’ll look like an amateur and run the risk of losing customers!
Keep Your Customers Loyal with These 4 Tips
1. Ensure consistency in billing: Any inaccuracy or delay in billing can cause your customers to lose faith in you. By ensuring consistency in billing, you can enhance customer trust in your services.
2. Keep customer information safe: The information provided by customer is critical as it has their personal credentials. Invest in an OCS and billing solution that has safety measures in place to protect customer info.
3. Offer Cross-product discounts: By offering innovative discounts like cross-product discounts, you can keep your customers interested in your subscription. Cross-product discounts can also be useful in promoting a new product that customers are not accustomed to.
4. Allow for customer self-service: With millenials seeking more control over their subscriptions, it is best to invest in a billing solution that allows customers to create their own customized plans.