Streamlining Exception Management for a Leading Water Utility
A leading water utility faced a rising backlog of billing and meter exceptions that had grown unmanageable over several years. These process breakdowns impacted revenue collection, regulatory compliance, and customer experience. Greencastle was engaged to address the root causes behind the exceptions, streamline workflows, and introduce governance to sustain long-term performance. The engagement also included a subproject to optimize outbound contact strategies. In total, the effort delivered more than $9.86M+ in value over two years, with continued savings projected annually, against a total project investment of $4.165M.
THE SOLUTION
The Greencastle team developed a comprehensive process optimization approach to generate immediate cost savings, prevent revenue leakage, and reduce regulatory risk.
Benefits
- Financial Impact & Cost Savings
$9.86M+ in total value delivered including: $5.8M in revenue recovery, $1.9M in future annual revenue loss avoided, $910K in hard cost savings, $1.28M+ in annual cost avoidance. - Improved Timely Resolutions
94% of cases resolved within 5 months (5% improvement) and improved average days to complete cases assigned to Ops Support from 64 days to 18 days. - Enterprise Visibility & Control
Our team introduced executive-level dashboards to track exception trends and established a scalable governance model for future process improvement.
APPROACH
Root Cause Analysis & Process Optimization
Greencastle led a comprehensive diagnostic effort, identifying that four exception types accounted for nearly half of all outstanding cases. The team launched a portfolio of 20 targeted projects aimed at eliminating root causes and improving exception resolution. Key initiatives included optimizing workflows within the utility’s ERP and workforce systems, redesigning service order logic, and refining business rules that governed exception triggers.
Technology Enhancements & Automation
Our team led working sessions to refine objectives and align initiatives under strategic themes. Cross-functional stakeholders helped shape clear goals, key results, and supporting tasks that anchored each parent initiative.
Analytics & Performance Governance
To ensure sustainability, Greencastle introduced new analytics dashboards providing visibility at both executive and frontline levels. These tools enabled targeted backlog reduction, proactive exception prevention, and clearer accountability across departments. A gold-standard process framework was also established to promote consistent ownership and organizational alignment.
CONCLUSION
This project transformed a high-cost, high-friction operational challenge into a streamlined, well-governed system that delivers measurable value. Through process redesign, system improvements, and embedded analytics, Greencastle helped the utility prevent revenue leakage, reduce regulatory risk, and improve both employee and customer experience. With the new framework in place, the utility is well-positioned to maintain control over exceptions, increase recoverable revenue, and sustain long-term operational gains.
