All the latest news from the Datamere team.
The last quarter has been an exceptionally busy time in the Datamere offices with 2 large projects nearing completion and preparation for another new supplier to come on board within the next month. Ongoing development within GENUS© also continues as a focus as do changes to our internal support process, all of which have kept us on our toes! The whole team have been working extremely hard on a variety of projects and functionality and we are very grateful for the commitment that the whole team shows to Datamere. Thank you everyone! The new services available from the Datamere Managed Services team have so far been very well received; almost all of our DMS clients are now using the shipper reconciliation service and we are now introducing a meter read and debt management service for those clients who have expressed an interest in these. The debtor manager service uses the internal ledger within GENUS© and allows you to trigger a number of actions to manage, chase and allocate outstanding debt, all of which can be handled by the team in Worcester.
In other news, most of you will have had some form of contact with Marcia Cox who has now moved into a new role within the business. Her focus is now to manage our internal support process and she has also become involved in some of our longer-term projects. There are more changes planned which we believe will make the process more efficient and help to improve our support process which we will explain in our scheduled calls.
Another area we’ve been investigating are our own internal IT structures to ensure optimum results. With this in mind there will be some changes over the coming months which will affect those clients we provide hosting and managed services for. We will be in touch directly if the changes affect you to explain more fully and answer any questions you may have about the process.
Finally, with Summer just around the corner, happy holidays to all of you off somewhere nice, we’ll be in touch in the Autumn with the latest run down of news and events.
Jon Hunt
It’s with great sadness that we tell you that Jon Hunt has passed away after a long battle with illness.
Jon worked as a developer for many years at Datamere and has been instrumental in the development of GENUS© Power flows. His understanding of the flow and database structures and the speed with which he was able to deliver the code meant he was a very valuable asset to Datamere, as well as being a close personal friend to many of the team. His love of a good party and playing live music meant he was very popular all around.
Jon passed away peacefully in the early hours of the 5th June and was surrounded by his family.
UNC Modification 0672 and Unidentified Gas
This modification has been raised to help manage the issue of Unidentified Gas which has been causing issues for shippers and supplier alike since the advent of Nexus. This particular modification seeks to reduce Unidentified Gas (UIG) volume by incentivising read submission performance for Product Class 4 sites. The proposal aims to measure read performance against an agreed performance target for energy reconciled after a defined period and apply incentive charges against those Shippers whose energy reconciliation performance is below the target threshold. If you would like to read the full details they can be found here https://gasgov-mst-files.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/ggf/book/2019-04/UNC%20Workgroup%20Report%200672%20v1.0.pdf
Your shipper will most likely have been in touch about this modification as they’ll be likely to pass any penalties directly onto suppliers. In order to assist our suppliers, DMS has recently introduced a telephone read service designed to assist with obtaining the reads required within the set parameters. We can run a series of reports which identify those sites which require action and attempt to obtain the readings. This process will also assist those suppliers who are using our reconciliation service as regular reads will ensure that the rolling AQs are updated regularly and in line with industry standards. This in turn leads to more accurate shipper invoicing and all helps towards reducing Unidentified Gas charges.
If you would like more information on any of the services please email julie@datamere.co.uk call us on 01625 525033.
New Configurable AQ Workflows in GENUS©
We hope that the recent functionality introduced should make life easier for those of you who manage the AQ review process on your portfolio!
The change allows the system/operator to only raise rolling AQ & rolling SOQ change workflow tasks if they are different by a configurable percentage which prevents an overload of active tasks for minimal changes.
If you require any help with turning on the new functionality please contact us on support@datamere.co.uk and we will be able to assist.
TRAS Reporting Functionality
This functionality which has recently been developed to support regulatory requirements is now available to purchase as a switch within GENUS©. The switch covers the functionality needed to produce the reports for both gas and power. The switch is available to purchase at £6,000 per fuel and if you would like more information contact julie@datamere.co.uk
Client Account Management and Support
Our new contact schedule has been in place since the start of the year and has been well received all around but as with all new processes it needs a slight tweak! If we’re not in touch with you regularly about an ongoing project we’ve been setting a regular call so we can discuss any outstanding and ongoing calls you have logged with us. What has quickly become apparent is once a month may be a little too often for these calls as we are finding it difficult to get dates confirmed and we don’t want this to become an annoyance. So, unless we have a different agreement already in place with you, we’ve decided to move these calls to bi-monthly. Of course, you can still contact us at any time with any issues, we just think that this frequency will be enough for the ongoing catch up calls.
We’ve also decided that the support reports have become redundant due to the fact that we revisit all calls in our telephone conversation so won’t be producing these moving forwards. Instead we will be concentrating on user guides for any new functionality we develop in GENUS© which we believe will be more beneficial for clients.
Industry News
As always with the utility industry there is lots going on! We caught up with a few people at Utility Week Live and suffice to say there are lots of changes afoot!
The new supplier review process is coming to a close which will see big changes in the way that new entrants come into the market place. The new Ofgem guidelines are intended to ensure that new suppliers have much more financial stability and processes in place to ensure that customer service standards are maintained and offer more protection to customers. With so many suppliers entering SOLR over the past 18 months, it will be interesting to see if the new changes have the expected positive effects.
New regulations are also being looked into for microbusinesses as Ofgem has announced a strategic review into the industry to ensure that this sector fully understands the contracts that they are entering into. A review will be published at the end of 2019 and this is likely to have far reaching implications for the way that the industry contracts and bills this type of customer.
https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/publications-and-updates/ofgem-announces-strategic-review-microbusiness-energy-market Faster switching is also very much at the forefront of the industry with Ofgem recently contacting suppliers to ensure that they are on board with the changes and able to make the necessary changes to their systems. Here at Datamere we are keeping up to date with the modification and the impact this will have.
Comments