Community Star Visit to Newcastle upon Tyne
On Thursday 12th October, myself, @martyn413 and @Schockwave were invited by @TiffJ to visit the EE operations centre based in Newcastle upon Tyne. As EE Community Stars, we have a wonderful role in that we are exposed to all levels of the organisation at EE and can feed back all the frustrations, problems and positives that you, the community members, express across the Community.
I'm very passionate about this Community and its growth. EE has a product which is unmatched across any network and that is our peer-to-peer Community. We can see the dedication EE have given to the Community in creating a bespoke Community Support Team who are able to enable you as the customer and create those bridges to troubleshoot any problems you might be experiencing. Then we have the Community Management Team who are always putting this Community on the map, both internally and externally, and making sure opportunities, information and developments come to the Community first.
Not only is it thanks to EE's staff, but also you, the valued member. Your voice is very much at the centre of all conversations EE has and it is clear to me now, from being a star for 12 months, that at times it may not be clear that you're being heard, but as someone who is a customer but also a Community Star, I can assure you that I have seen personally how each post is reviewed, recorded, actioned and monitored, and how the team really do care about the Community as a whole.
Marty, Shockwave and I arrived at Newcastle on Thursday and was met by @Miles, @Jon_B and @Imrana_K. We checked into our hotel, and made our way to the Operations Centre which was approximately a twenty-minute journey.
We arrived at the EE Operations Centre to be warmly greeted by Tiff. We signed in, passed security (which was tight!) and entered this vast building. The Operations Centre contains two floors, with hundreds of contact and support teams working out of here. We were given an inclusive tour of the building by @leanne_T, @Richard_C, @Lee_H, @Christopher_G and @Rebecca_H.
We started on the top floor which contained Level 1 and Level 2 Technical Support Teams. As I'm sure everyone is aware, the Level 2 teams have been working hard to solve the recent LTE problems we saw with the Apple Watch. I was introduced to Kayleigh who has been working with the Community Team to call back all community members who have experienced an error code on pairing and problem solving this for them direct. For me, this is what the Community is about. The Community here at EE is a peer to peer support one, which means we as a community, come together to offer support, insight and at times, humour. The Team recognised the importance the Community plays and responded to this, by creating a referral process for the Community Team to refer all cases directly to Kayleigh, who is a member of Level 2 Technical Support. We learnt that this resulted in almost all the community members receiving a fix and they are now enjoying their Apple Watch thanks to this effort.
Next on the agenda was to meet the Transformation Billing Team, who had travelled from Wales and Portsmouth to come and speak to us, which was amazing! This team are small but have their aims set high in transforming numerous aspects of the Billing experience we all have. So, this covers:
- The look and feel of our billing, both online and offline.
- Fixing some known inconsistencies with how certain types of billing is display and visible to you.
- Discussing new features which are coming soon, so stay tuned!
- And most importantly, asking us as Star's, what are the common problems, questions or concerns raised in the Community, so they can pick these up and look to add them to their change plan.
I have always made it clear that I'm not a technical Star. I am about enabling and supporting a community and of course, everything iPhone and Apple Watch (ha!)! However, this session really showed EE's commitment to this Community and a vital change team travelling a long distance to come and speak to us, was just great. Marty certainly had the technical aspects covered and did us well!
We then spoke to Derek who was leading EE's strategy on online safety and what role EE wants to have with helping reduce child safety risks online and how to inform and enable parents/adults to be assured that their children's devices are safe for them to use online. This is my passion, and certainly something I have been heavily involved with for over three years now. Without me being biased as a Community Star, EE really are going above and beyond with colleagues from BT and Plusnet with this initiative. I don't want to spoil the details which are coming out in the next few months, but take my word, if you're a parent or adult who has responsibilities for children's online safety, then you'll be excited to see what EE and their partners have coming up.
I thought I would end this blog on a high. Last on the agenda was a presentation from Jon on all things Apple, yay I hear you cry, or is that just my excitement?! As this presentation was packed with a lot of information spanning a wide range of products, I thought it would be best to break my highlights down in simple bullet points:
- Jon explained that from lessons learnt from the iPhone 7 launch, the Community Team really wanted to push for a bespoke Order Tracking System for this years Apple keynote. As you know the new tracking system was created and implemented. However, we did see a bug in the new system, and to be honest, with any new system, which did undergo testing, there will always be slight glitches or anomalies, until it has been tested during a live phase. As soon as this was identified, urgent work commenced to find a fix, on which EE has and the current Order Tracking is working correctly and is ready for the upcoming iPhone X release.
- The Community Team have devised a strategy for communication for upcoming iPhone X pre-order launch. This plan really focuses on learning from previous releases and within reason of course, looks to increase information from within the Community.
- There is anticipated high demand for the iPhone X and EE as a preferred partner of Apple, will be working around the clock to make sure all orders are fulfilled as soon as they can be and if there are delays for whatever reason, then the Order Tracker will be updated.
It was a real pleasure to meet the entire Community Support and Management Team. Throughout the day, the team would constantly be taking it in turns to make sure there was always a presence on the Community, as they genuinely really cared about making the Community the best it could possibly be.
Thank you, EE, for your hospitality and transparency in having us for the day and for your continued passion and energy for our Community.
Ben
Community Star
