Looking to the future
One Touch Switch: simplifying the switch between broadband providers
The One Touch Switch initiative, led by telecoms industry regulator Ofcom, is a major step forward in simplifying how customers switch broadband providers.
Under this new scheme, customers no longer need to coordinate between both their current and new provider when they want to change to another provider and tariff. Instead, they simply contact their new provider, which manages all aspects of the transfer, from billing to activation dates.
This behind-the-scenes management aims to reduce the hassle of switching and ensure minimal disruption, with most customers experiencing downtime of less than a day.
While One Touch Switch is a significant development, it hasn’t yet incorporated open banking. However, open banking technology could play an important role in similar future initiatives. By providing secure, streamlined ways to verify customer data and payments, open banking has the potential to further enhance the switching experience by automating and simplifying consent, validation, and payment processes.
As telecoms continue to evolve, leveraging innovations like open banking could enable providers to offer even more efficient, transparent, and customer-friendly services.
Conclusion
The integration of open banking and smart data in the telecoms sector is poised to revolutionise the industry. For broadband and mobile providers, it clears a path to significant cost reductions through automated billing, improved customer retention, and enhanced fraud prevention.
For example, trade associations UK Finance and the GSM Association of mobile network operators have recently collaborated with EE, Virgin Media O2, Three and Vodafone to help reduce authorised push payment (APP) fraud. The ‘Scam Signal’ API analyses near real-time network data to effectively identify and tackle fraudulent bank transfers.
Vodafone led the initial development of Scam Signal, completing a successful three-month pilot which improved scam detection by 30 per cent at a major UK bank.
Meanwhile, consumers and SMEs stand to benefit from more flexible, transparent, and personalised broadband and mobile services, simpler switching and access to more cost-effective tariffs. In turn, this will support innovation and competition in a sector which is estimated to be worth £33 billion.
