Incur Lower Warranty Cost While Generating Greater Revenue
In dealing with warranty packages, organizations around the globe are known to suffer leakage, of thousands of dollars, due to unoptimized claim-processing loopholes. It is advisable to improve how you administer and track all your warranty claims holistically, leaving zero room for false claims. To be able to improve profits, a closed-loop warranty system is necessary. Customer satisfaction is the key. Every organization strives for it in innovative ways. But the best hassle-free claim processing experience customers can get when you have a robust warranty-operations controlling system. Rules-based technology Most of the time, organizations tend to bleed valuable revenue through fraudulent claims, as they have limited control over warranty operations with rigid and worn-out systems. Therefore, it is advisable to implement IT for it to function according to business rules and organization policies accurately. A typical claim process starts from submission, pre-approval, claim evaluation, final approval, and disbursement. The entire cycle needs to be automated along with the incorporation of an EWS (early warning system) to capture real-time cost drivers. Field-asset tracking and management As business dynamics have grown complex, organizations need a system to facilitate field-asset tracking and management better. It is the most important part of warranty management, as it keeps account of the replaceable parts at any given point of time. That, in turn, helps the organization to make provisions in the accounting books to allocate funds and other resources optimally. Orchestration with real-time data For businesses to reap maximum benefit from warranty software, they need to implement a technology which perfectly syncs dealers, service centers, suppliers, service providers, and of course, the OEM itself. Orchestration of the sort makes it possible to share real-time data on business activities across global locations and assess the associated warranty liabilities. An integrated data-driven workflow is essential to limit warranty spend and enhance customer satisfaction. A cut in the warranty spend, in turn, can release more funds, which a smart organization may use to improve product quality through investments in expertise and state-of-the-art R&D facilities. Final thoughts Organizations can use automated analytics and reports to re-evaluate their spend analytics from time to time. It will help them create room for extra savings. After all, the ability to improve aftermarket services in the manufacturing sector depends on how well you optimize other costs. Claim processing itself can be cumbersome and incur massive overheads, with tons of unmanageable paperwork and countless phone calls. Such processes are nothing but revenue killers, which can be streamlined to help focus on productive operations. It is important to stop possessing expensive workforce and spend less time on processes—an attainable goal for manufacturers, which is fast becoming a necessity at all altitudes of the industry.
Extended Warranties: A Retrospection
In today’s competitive business environment, organizations are concentrating not just on sales but the aftermarket promises – made in the form of extended warranties. While people have been reading the abundant material, written by skeptics, on why extended warranties might do more harm than good, efficient contract management has proved to be the key to retaining and expanding customer bases for many manufacturers. There is a growing need for organizations to imbibe technological innovation into their culture. The current drive is to automatically manage rules for payouts, contact deadlines, rates, replaceable spares, and so forth. A better customer management process can only be achieved with an end-to-end support system in place. What customers like Customers relentlessly crave for more – every time and are willing to spread the good words about your brand if you make them feel that warranty claims are a cakewalk. Organizations, thus, use intelligence-driven claim-submission modules for customers to avoid unnecessary interactions. Extended warranty holds the key to OEM profitability, and in the long run, helps achieve deeper market penetration with smart, dynamic pricing. It is a general observation that a field asset may not be replaced entirely, especially if the spare is not included in the warranty. That is where you can create the scope for a customer to benefit from the power of dynamic pricing while offering extended warranty. You can offer to replace the spare for a one-time payment, which optimally covers the cost and doesn’t create a burden on any of the sides of the business. Thus, extended warranty helps attract more customers and improves ROI, while increasing your aftermarket profitability. Offering what customers prefer With artificial intelligence and machine learning enabled features like new quote management, OEMs and dealers can reach out to customers with new offers and promotions. Preparation of such offers can be a daunting task for sales teams, but with smart technology, they can progress efficiently. In this way, customers can benefit from real-time pre-approved discounts, pricing updates, the latest products and services, and more. Organizations are looking for platforms which can deliver such information in a customized way and increase the real value offered to customers. Extended warranty a common practice Decentralized operations of extended warranty have reaped benefits for organizations as well as customers. It is standard practice these days that dealers or distributors offer extended warranties in addition to standard warranties provided by OEMs. This approach creates value and captures market share by extending goodwill toward the market. And, finally It is imperative for OEMs to monitor their internal policies continuously and maintain their command over operations. That would prevent leakage through fraudulent claims and add to customer delight. Organizations require a flexible technology arm, which can modify, cancel, and alter contracts as per client demands, but in line with the organization culture. Get to know more about ideas and thoughts from a team that is passionate about delivering artificial intelligence and machine learning solutions that impact customers’ core businesses. Have something to say about this blog post? Share it with us on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Meet our AfterMarket experts at Warranty Chain Management conference, WCM 2018 in San Diego from March 6-8, Booth 11.
Tavant Launches Next Version of its Advanced Warranty Management Solution on Salesforce AppExchange
Santa Clara, Calif., February 15, 2017 – Tavant, a leading global provider of Warranty Management Software, today announced the launch of the latest version of its warranty management application – The ‘Tavant Warranty On-Demand 1.5’ on Salesforce AppExchange. Tavant Warranty On-Demand (TWOD) is the only native warranty management app on Force.com platform. It enables complete warranty lifecycle management and helps reduce warranty costs & reserves, increase supplier recovery, and enhance warranty forecasting accuracy. The all-new version of TWOD is Salesforce lightning compatible and extremely user-friendly. It offers an improved outlook to setting up and automatically enforcing warranty coverage exclusions resulting in increased automatic claims processing. The new release also comes equipped with fully-automated returns management including out-of-the-box integrations with freight carriers and an automated supplier recovery workflow, enabling the customers to recover up to 40% of warranty expenses from component suppliers. “We strive for 100% automation of warranty processes, which empowers warranty teams to focus on improving customer value and satisfaction. The latest version of TWOD allows warranty crews to drastically cut down on claim cycle times by achieving a higher level of process automation,” said Vikas Khosla, Vice-President at Tavant. The release also focusses on service campaigns management – permitting flexibility to setup, manage and recall campaigns and, integrates features like ‘notification to the customer till payment from supplier supporting campaign’. For more information mail us at [email protected]. Find Tavant on LinkedIn and Twitter. Media Contact: Vibhor Mishra Tavant +1 (408) 519-5400 [email protected] tavant.com
Solving the Problem of Inefficient Handling of Goods Return with Reverse Logistics
Have you felt that overlooking reverse logistics puts your organization behind others who master the discipline? If yes, it is not you alone, as there are many organizations yet to decide that reverse logistic is a strategic concern. However, it involves adopting the most efficient way of dealing with the process. Reverse logistics is the practice of efficient transportation of finished products from their destinations back to their origin to capture residual value (or salvage value). Manufacturers want to retrieve defective products efficiently from their valuable customers, and IT solutions are a definitive boost in that context. By improving the process, manufacturers can save costs and speed up their service to ultimately promote a positive brand image. It also helps the marketing aspect of business significantly. How large organizations tackle typical challenges To pursue the fresh stock, companies have started focusing on clearing old inventory. However, to do so, there are several hindrances for enterprises. Due to huge sales volumes and extensive customer bases, organizations face the problem of many unidentified and unauthorized returns. Warranty management software establishes total control over such processes by maintaining unique product identification numbers and tracking mechanisms. As all the claims are managed automatically through software, there is no scope for unauthorized system inventory movement without a laid down protocol being followed. Most of the time, organizations are unable to write off a significant amount of returned inventory held in their warehouses. The claim processing rate is far lower than the inward-inventory movement rate, which results from a lack of return agreements with retailers. The latest warranty software are a step ahead in this aspect, as they manage the return policies and protocols laid down right from the beginning of product life cycle. Software capabilities Warranty systems come with cross-functional integration capacity and minimize the claim-processing time, helping improve customer confidence. With high-level integration, the collection of goods from customers can be managed automatically. The software can be synchronized with third-party logistics providers (3PLs). As soon as a claim is processed, an automated intimation is sent to initiate the collection sequence. After the inventory arrives at the organization premises, it is accounted for automatically against a goods receipt note (GRN), leaving no gap for fraudulent claims. With traceability to this extent, organizations can extract maximum value from salvage of the returned goods in parallel to a hassle-free operation. Companies can also re-engineer and reintroduce the product back to the market and derive profit. Meet Tavant warranty experts at Booth #3 at 13th Annual Warranty Chain Management Conference (WCM) on Mar 7th-9th, 2017 in Tuscon, AZ
Do Away with Unwieldy Warranty Challenges: BI & Data Warehousing
Business processes become complicated due to inefficient data sharing. Smart technologies may have brought some improvements with real-time insights about your business ecosystem, but it gets much tougher in the case of an organization dealing with large after-market operations, like in the event of warranty administration and management. A more efficient warranty management system should enhance OEM’s reach to its customers. Numerous factors are affecting the warranty domain. And managing these factors becomes the primary goal for any manufacturing organization. The latest advancements in technology use cutting-edge Business Intelligence (BI) and corresponding Data Warehousing (DW) techniques. These methods are bundled into an advanced management system, which can help you establish more control over your business. Stakeholder experience Business houses willing to maximize their revenue function must empower their stakeholders such as service centers, dealers, distributors and so forth. It is necessary to exploit the capabilities of a linear integrated workflow, which will help reduce warranty costs. Organizations need to aim for maximum customer satisfaction, which can only come from a pleasant, hassle-free warranty claim experience. Automation Technology in this context should be advanced enough to process 90% claims in an automated manner with the help of BI. Such a system can manage complex processes, application data inputs, historical claim trends, data mining, and predictive analysis, and churn out useful results and reports in no time. DW for benchmarking With the use of advanced data warehousing techniques, coupled with robust warranty technology, your organization can keep track of the entire life cycle of the product, which would be beneficial in benchmarking the critical quality parameters. Where does your current technology stand? Does your warranty technology automatically draw references from the claim data with the benchmark data and churn out automatically generated quality reports? That is not the only aspect which is necessary. The technology should aid product development based on claims history as well. Setting up the technology should also be simple. Industrial standards require it to be carried out within minutes and without the support of your internal IT department. A modular, in-house, platform-based architecture should help speed up the integration of the software with your organization’s IT landscape, which might include legacy systems. It should allow cost-effective future expansions as per your business needs as well. It’s all about customer experience! With the use of BI and advanced analytics, your customer can get the power of a mobile-based application, which can be used to make a claim. After a claim is recorded, instantaneously the software should analyze the policies and the procedure for claim disbursement. If it is necessary to summon a field staff, then the message should automatically be sent to the nearest available personnel. Only then can the customer walk away with an enhanced experience, helping create a better brand image and market reach. Meet Tavant warranty experts at Booth #3 at 13th Annual Warranty Chain Management Conference (WCM) on Mar 7th-9th, 2017 in Tuscon, AZ
Gaining Competitive Edge with Connected, Data-Intensive Warranty Systems
Since raw data hardly serves any purpose, it needs to be analyzed. One of the biggest problems with the warranty business is huge quantities of data getting generated every second. This data, coming from various sources, needs to be analyzed. Data makes sense when channeled to specific points of input. Once the data is processed into actionable insights, business units can develop enough intelligence to improve the decision quality. How intensive is data? Data normally comes from business transactions and social media, besides other capture points like sensors. Ideally, reporting and analysis should match the speed at which data is being generated. Data proves useful when various thoughtful points are developed for it to be translated into effective strategies—through real-time knowledge of workflow and market parameters. Data-intensive warranty management solutions The term data-intensive computing is used to describe applications that are I/O bound. Such applications devote the largest fraction of execution time to leverage the movement of data. They can be identified by evaluating “computational bandwidth”—the number of bytes of data processed per floating-point operation.[1] Warranty management applications being conceived these days belong to that category and handle big data to help us understand the core problems. One of the most important goals of such technology is to reduce decision-making liabilities. For good decision making, it is preferable to use data that covers a vast expanse of the warranty ecosystem and enables insights closer to reality. Without big data, quantity and quality of insights become limited to just some transactions and the immediate ecosystem. A warranty management application must be connected to the maximum possible data input points for the best possible analysis. The application should cover all possible operational, monetary, mechanical, and market-oriented data sources such as public records of other competitors, telematics, manufacturing methods, and customer touch points. Gaining customer preference, cutting cost, and competitive edge With the help of a connected, data-intensive warranty management system, it is possible to cut down costs. Once we have surrounded our system with a set of technologies to handle big data, and thereafter enabled warranty analytics, we are able to analyze the causes of product failures and make improvements—eventually cutting the cost borne during warranty services. Data and analytics also help us to predict optimal allocation for warranty reserves more accurately. This results in smoother business operation with accurate budget allocation. Data-capture technology also let us implement customer service through faster electronic medium such as mobile apps and cut a great amount of service costs. In the long run, the right analytics platform helps us facilitating effective monitoring of all activities, including Claims registered per user, in real time. With software improving real-time visibility into our ecosystem and customer-facing processes, the rate of success in decision making is growing manifold. It also helps us in identifying the genuine claims faster with more accuracy. Eventually, generating more values for customers by reducing the endless waiting time for the verification to be completed. The damaged parts can be tracked and recovered, if needed, using radio frequency. And therefore, the supplier performance can be rated accurately. Using such an approach, notifications are timely, allowing value chain partners to identify areas of improvement and realize more value. This helps in improving overall efficiency to bolster the bottom line for a business. [1] Reagan W. Moore, Arcot Rajasekar, et. al., Data Intensive Computing, (Association for Computer Machinery Digital Library, 2007), Chapter 5.1.
Tavant Sponsors the Global Warranty and Service Contracts Association Conference
Santa Clara, Calif., September 20, 2016: Tavant, a leading global provider of warranty management and warranty on-demand software, today announced that it will be the platinum sponsor and exhibitor at the Third Annual GWSCA Conference 2016, to be held at the Palmer House Hotel, Chicago from September 21 to 23. Rohit Lohan and Ashu Kohli, from the Tavant Warranty team, will deliver presentations to address key industry issues. Apart from its cloud and custom application development capabilities, Tavant Technologies will also showcase Tavant Manufacturing Analytics Platform (TMAP) – helping customers with real-time decisions on fraudulent claims, statistical approach for pricing extended warranties, automating claim decision making and leveraging IOT data to improve operational efficiency, such as auto-scheduling of preventive maintenance. “Tavant has leveraged its industry knowledge and expertise to arrive at solutions that help reduce warranty costs, speed up recovery, enhance forecasting and predict fraud claims,” said Vibhor Mishra, head of marketing for Tavant Technologies. “This conference gives us a great opportunity to interact with warranty management and service contracts professionals from leading organizations and showcase our innovative solutions.” Get an opportunity to meet and learn from Tavant Warranty experts at exhibit #9, The Palmer House Hilton Hotel, 17 East Monroe Street, Chicago, IL. Find Tavant Technologies on LinkedIn and Twitter. Media Contact: Vibhor Mishra Tavant Technologies Inc. +1 (408) 519-5400 [email protected] www.tavant.com
How Automation of Warranty Processing Adds Happiness to Dealers, Service Centers, and Customers
The sheer volume and complexity of warranty claims can be overwhelming for organizations. This makes fraud-check on claims quite cumbersome. But if precision is your motto, start by re-engineering slow manual processes. Wonder why? They are prone to errors and impede productivity. Strive to achieve maximum automation in the processing of claims. Automation comes with several benefits: Meticulous data extraction followed by validation Quicker claims processing Single version of truth across manufacturer/dealer/service-center locations, thus improving efficiency Transparency in the process Let’s examine how the process flows with automation The automation of warranty processing begins with claims. Technology allows customers to submit claims from any location. On the other hand, the organization is able to track the claims. The system allows manufacturers to set rules, so that claims on every product can be processed in a unique way, if necessary. With the system automated, it is easy to validate claims efficiently. Minute details across various dealer locations can be confirmed in real time. It is also possible to route the claim details according to specific job codes, both within and outside the organization due to the cross-functional integration available in the system. The system helps track suppliers of the parts under claim. This speeds up parts-return and supplier recovery, and upholds trust and transparency. Further, payments can be made according to specific prevailing rates for a particular claim. Here is how you stand to gain A user-friendly platform that simplifies and speeds up the claims process makes life easier for customers and service providers Total automation of processes that were earlier manual—submission of claim, routing of claim, parts return, supplier recovery, payments—ensures accuracy, reduces the drudgery of long-drawn paper work, and improves efficiency Accurate and reduced warranty payouts result in optimal performance Visibility and communication at every step of the lifecycle is improved The overall cost of warranty processing and associated administration comes down Errors related to warranty claims are reduced to a minimum Parts return and supplier recovery are made simpler and more transparent Fraudulent and duplicate claims are actively screened and totally eliminated Down there, do you see happier customers, saved money, and more efficient delivery of services? I think I do.
WoD (Warranty on Demand) Series – Configuring Payment Rules
WoD (Warranty on Demand) – is a cloud based warranty management system developed by Tavant Technologies to automate and optimize warranty process of global organizations. WoD’s comprehensive list of functions can make it one of the best warranty management system to resolve the warranty related problems of different organizations The high configurability of the system allows users to easily build business rules to adapt to the corresponding OEM’s warranty processes. One such key process is Claim Payment and the logic toward arriving at the payment amount. The service network structure varies from organization to organization. Contracts between OEMs and their servicing dealers may also vary which will result in their labor being different. Regulations may vary from country to country resulting in added surcharges and taxes. The complexity starts when OEMs want to calculate the claim payment using these small adjustments and their inability to adjust. WoD has the capability of resolving complex scenarios of different organizations efficiently. In WoD, users can create customized logic to calculate their claim payment using multiple rules. Here, the claim payment is divided into three segments so that configurations can be done for every scenario effectively. The three segments are: OEMs can create and configure all cost categories that is required at the time of calculating claim payment. These cost categories will determine the values that a dealer can enter while filing a claim. Examples of cost categories are: labor cost, travel cost, parking cost and meals cost. OEMs may configure multiple cost categories in the system but every claim may not require all cost categories to calculate payment – so, an OEM can specify the cost categories that the system will account for calculating payments. Pre-defined cost categories are linked with policies and based on the rules created, system will calculate the claim payment by selecting a policy for a particular claim. Modifying the payment information is generally linked to the cost categories selected for calculation of claim payment. This is a set of rules that an OEM may create if they want to change the payout for a particular dealer and/or machine/part claim. These attributes make it possible to override a claim payment previously calculated with basic payment rules. As WoD brings the agility of Salesforce.com with it, organizations will find it extremely easy to use as it can be accessed from anywhere due to its cloud functionality. If we consider warranty management in a global scale – the scope is changing rapidly and the main aim of building WoD is to focus on understanding the future of warranty management. WoD is already loaded up with all new releases provided by Salesforce till date and periodic feature upgrades from our experts make it a dynamic system for resolving warranty management issues.
Tavant to Launch Innovative Warranty Claim Fraud Analytics Solution at Warranty Chain Management Conference
Santa Clara, Calif., March 16, 2016: Tavant, a leading global provider of Warranty Management Software, today announced that it will be launching its state of the art warranty claim fraud analytics solution at the Warranty Chain Management Conference (WCM) 2016, being held in Jacksonville, FL. The launch will be held on Wednesday, March 16; the second day of the conference at Tavant booth. “Warranty claim fraud is a significant challenge for enterprises globally. Companies lose billions of dollars due to fraudulent claims. Our fraud analytics solutions help detect fraudulent claims and transactions with a high degree of accuracy. We offer a proactive approach to fraud management by predicting and flagging claims that are likely to be fraudulent,” said Roshan Pinto, Head of Manufacturing Practice, Tavant Technologies. The solution, based on revolutionary statistical and machine learning methods helps companies detect rapidly and respond to fraudulent claim submissions. This system also develops ‘intelligence’ to point out those dealers who are repetitive fraud committers. Visit Tavant booth #3 to learn more. Find Tavant on LinkedIn and Twitter. Media Contact: Vibhor Mishra Tavant Technologies Inc. +1 (408) 519-5400 [email protected] tavant.com