PG&E Revolutionizes Outage Communication with SmartComms and SmartETOR
PG&E embarked on a transformational initiative to improve its electric outage notifications after discovering that 37% of customers experiencing unplanned outages weren’t receiving timely updates. In response, PG&E created the Outage Journey Team, a cross-functional group that developed SmartComms to streamline and centralize outage communications, dramatically improving notification consistency, reducing notification delivery times, improving notification accuracy and ensuring consistency across all customer channels. Alongside this, the team developed SmartETOR – an innovative machine learning algorithm that provides accurate, auto-generated ETORs and continuously improves over time. This award-winning effort earned the Gold Outage Communications Award and showcases how PG&E’s bold use of technology enhanced customer trust, experience, and operational efficiency.
Speaker: Carl Schoenhofer, Director, Customer Outage Journey at Pacific Gas and Electric Company
Carl has been with PG&E for 12 years. As the Director, Customer Outage Journey PMO, he leads a matrixed team to improve customers’ end-to-end outage experiences. Previously he was a Regional Senior Manager where he served as the cross functional leader and led a number of strategic initiatives to address customer and community pain-points in the areas of capacity, reliability and PSPS. Prior to coming to PG&E, Carl worked as a Vice-President & General Manager in the sawmill industry and as Chief Financial Officer for a Dairy Cooperative.
