Electricity distribution company Caruna and Nextcon started working together at the beginning of 2018, when Caruna decided to create customer journeys that are more digitally enabled, while automating customer communications and improving the user experience of digital services. Nextcon was given responsibility for managing development projects in a multi-vendor environment.

The cooperation started with the development of Caruna’s online services for end customers. Nextcon participated in workshops at Caruna, where customer personas were first defined in a business-driven way, followed by customer paths. It was important to be involved from the very beginning in order to ensure smooth cooperation. Caruna’s electronic services to its customers are a combination of several different service providers. Nextcon has also been involved in the preparation of calls for tenders and the tendering of suppliers.

“Moving forward with the DevOps model”

In the Customer Service Digitalisation project, the role of Scrummaster was played by Nextcon consultants.

This development is based on a mobile-first approach, where new online services are designed primarily with mobile users in mind. The development process also follows a continuous improvement model (“DevOps”). This allows development packages to be more compact and faster to release. Caruna also has the possibility to quickly influence the content under development.

“With the Agile development model, new services can be made available to the customer in a short timeframe, while in a traditional project the customer may have to wait several years for services. The absolute advantage of this model is that customer feedback is received immediately and requests for changes can be taken into account in the next development cycle.”

Elina Lehtomäki, Development Director

Services available according to customers’ needs and wishes

The aim of the development is to create a clear digital service package for Caruna, which will enable the customer to have a multi-channel service offering with 24/7 opening hours.

Over the past year, agile development methods have resulted in the release of major developments such as the all-new Caruna+ mobile app for managing daily tasks and improving automated communication, and the Caruna Marketplace, where customers and service providers offering home energy solutions, such as solar panel suppliers, can easily and reliably find each other.

The existing offer has also been diversified. A lot of new content has been added to the customer My Pages service, such as the ability to pay bills, transfer due dates and authorise another person, such as your own electricity contractor, to handle things.

The next developments are already well underway: energy monitoring for self-consumption is seeing usability improvements and a facelift. Improvements are also coming to the usability and clarity of the My Pages!

“Nextcon coordinates the multi-vendor environment so that development needs are completed in a synchronised timeframe and our customers can rapidly deploy new services.”

Petri Lagerqvist, Business Specialist