New Technology Taking LG&E, KU Customer Service to the Next Level
Friday, September 13, 2013
When it comes to electric utility
service, no one likes being left in the dark. Now, Louisville Gas and Electric
Company and Kentucky Utilities Company have new technology designed to help
reduce those crucial minutes customers are without service.
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| Line technicians Chris Head (foreground) and Ron Hudson (background) use their ruggedized laptop to access the new mobile technology software. |
This new technology comes in the
form of computers and mobile capabilities being deployed to our entire fleet of field crew trucks, from now through November. Currently, we rely on a combination of two-way radios and notes taken from radio
exchanges to relay information about an incident between dispatch and field
personnel.
With the new mobile devices and associated software, crews in the
field will receive work orders and send back data electronically, in their
trucks.
This $7.2 million project
improves the utilities’ service to customers by:
- Expediting communication between field crews and dispatchers
- Reducing opportunity for errors and incomplete information
- Cutting down the amount of time that passes before decisions can be made on how to best repair and restore service.
“In the past, mobile technology
and applications were not a viable option for our electric services because of
their limitations,” said John Wolfe, director of Electric System Restoration
and Distribution for LG&E and KU. “Now that they are, field personnel will
have much more information at their fingertips to help assess problems and
respond to them. Their use of the mobile interface will also allow critical
outage restoration information to be updated in near-real time in the customer
information system, which means more efficient service and a better customer
experience.”
Technology like this is
especially critical as we celebrate September as National Preparedness month
and mark the fifth anniversary of the Sept. 14, 2008 windstorm. The storm
caused extensive damage throughout the community and knocked out power to more
than 376,000 LG&E and KU customers.
In the years since the windstorm,
we have made system upgrades totaling more than $1 billion.
Among
those enhancements:
- A new state-of-the-art customer information system, including an online outage map, online outage reporting, a smartphone application and web-based options
- Programs to inspect/treat/replace utility poles, remove hazardous trees, and identify circuits needing improvements
- A project to improve a portion of the downtown underground network
And, check out the attached video of the devastation caused by the wind storm and our swift response:
