scte PRESENTS
So they do a really, really good job of managing end-to-end latency.”
A second major theme was frontline capability: whether the people doing installs can explain results, handle customer questions, and avoid needless callouts. CityFibre’s Chris Kelly warned that customers now arrive armed with advice from AI tools and forums, and installers can end up on the back foot. He put forward a simple solution: “getting more knowledge into the installer side of things… so they can actually answer it with a bit of confidence… rather than trying to shove it off”. Without that, he said, contracted workforces under time pressure will default to “we’ll just put it in and whether it’s working or not, we’ll leave.” Audience member Doug Williams, took us from “install testing” to “lifecycle testing”, arguing activation is the beginning, not the end: “I don’t think it’s about early life testing, it’s about continuous testing… we have to get to the point that we are measuring that life cycle… from cradle to grave.” Williams also offered a hard definition of failure: “If a customer has to call into your customer care centre, you failed… we should be able to have that data to tell the customer there’s an issue either in your network or an issue on the Internet.” But this is complicated by who holds the customer relationship. CityFibre’s Kelly noted the first touch point is often the
Kelly described CityFibre’s approach: inspection probes that use a simple rating (“Red, Amber, Green”), mandatory photo uploads, and AI evaluation; optical power tests captured at required points; and speed-test results uploaded to a cloud system with geolocation and service- ID checks. The logic is to lock results to tools and automate validation: “As soon as you introduce anything where there’s geolocations and stuff, people quickly realise that they will get found out.” McGowan agreed, describing systems where “the results are locked into the test tools, and the data has come straight off the test tools… so there’s no interference.” Kelly’s final warning was that the conversation itself has become a warning sign: “We’ve probably been talking about the same stuff for the last five years. What I don’t want to be doing in five year’s time is to be having the same panel discussion.”
ISP, not the network operator – even if customers blame the wholesale brand. Whitehead argued those interactions can still be a competitive advantage: “having a customer service interaction is a chance… to excel and gain loyalty… you’re allowed to fail once… but that customer experience has to be great every time… because eventually they’re not your customer anymore.” From the floor, Tim Clark (CityFibre) argued we may be focusing on the wrong measurements. Instead of obsessing over consumer speed tests, he said, activation should ensure a quality optical install ready for next-gen services: “We shouldn’t be looking at the speed test, we should be looking at things like optical power meters, inspection probes on a customer install. There was concern over how to prevent “blagged” test results. Asked how to stop engineers gaming the process,
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