Disruptive suppliers need robust solutions to scale
Inspire Telecom recognised the need for a customer service-focused telecom provider after many years working in the sector. They needed a payments partner that could grow and scale with them, matching their aspiration to provide market-leading services.
The challenge
As a new business owner, Ray was faced with a dilemma. He recognised the need for recurring payments, and the right rails were Direct Debit, but he struggled to find the right partner. “We tried the bank, but they wanted us to have a history, and we were a brand-new business”, Ray recalls.
Vetting several providers, he noticed that their internal processes meant he wasn’t able to speak to anyone. “Coming from telecoms, the whole problem we were trying to fix for our customers was the ability to speak with someone directly if there was a problem,” he remarks. "The team were there from day one - we established a named contact, and they were engaged, ready to work with us to find the right set-up for our business”.
The solution
Starting up, Inspire went with an off-the-shelf billing platform, and the provider worked with them to integrate into their reconciliation processes. As they grew, they stayed with us whilst making changes to their technology stack to suit their growing ambitions. Although they have named second line technical support as standard, our systems have been so easy to use that Ray has not needed to call, and the integration into the new billing software works seamlessly.
"Whenever there is a problem, we can call someone, and what I really love is that we’re all on first-name terms, which is so refreshing.”
Having seen the business grow first hand, our staff have been part of the Inspire journey since inception, forging a powerful relationship which has carried over to multiple business interests of the owners.
The impact
When asked about reconciliation, Ray recalls the transparency of billing to be one of the shining lights of the service. Inspire see exactly what worked and didn’t work each time, twinned with the reporting, and they get another chance to reach out to customers where payments fail to put it right.
“The fact that we have pre-built reports means we can easily dip check where we are. None of the competitors could offer this.”
Referencing the suite of available reports, such as the exclusive successful collection report, Ray and his team have been able to achieve unparalleled BI at their fingertips through our powerful, customer portal.
When it comes to fees, Ray highlights why he picked us as a payments partner when setting up his business. “We know exactly how much is coming out, when and why. There’s nothing to interpret, it’s all there”, Ray explains that other providers he reviewed made it very difficult to understand fees and introduced an uncertainty with percentage-based charges, which make financial planning more challenging.
Inspire have experienced massive growth since going live with Direct Debit and continue to grow their recurring revenue by up to 10% a month.
From the first call, they took the time to understand what we wanted to achieve and worked with us to get there.