Case Study
McMillin Homes
Key Business Challenge
McMillin San Antonio needed to improve customer service and to free up staff time by reducing time spent dealing with internal system problems and time spent retrieving frequently requested information and documents for customers. McMillin San Antonio wanted to make it as easy as possible for customers to submit requests or concerns about their new home during and after the construction process. In addition, McMillin wanted the ability to quickly respond to these requests and to provide a "self-service" option for customers whenever possible.
Background
McMillin Homes occupies a growing niche market, valuing themselves above mass-producing homebuilders but below high-end custom home builders. McMillin San Antonio believes in providing customers with tools that enable them to serve themselves. McMillin San Antonio was also looking to implement a stable and user-friendly program to replace an existing internal program that crashed intermittently and was full of bugs. McMillin San Antonio turned to Denim Group to provide a solution.
During the homebuilding process, customers would frequently call into McMillin with various requests including updates on the status of their homes or documentation pertaining to their homes such as warranty documents, closing documents, contracts and addendums. If there was a problem with a home, a customer would have to contact staff directly. McMillin San Antonio wanted to streamline the process of fulfilling customer requests without hiring additional staff and still provide customers with a high level of service.
Denim Group Solution
Using the Microsoft .NET platform, Denim Group designed and implemented a web-based ticket-management system allowing customers to submit "trouble tickets" regarding their homes from the time they contracted for purchase forward. The new issue tracking system simplified the process for customers to submit tickets by automatically routing and reporting on the status of the claims to the appropriate department within McMillin Homes. Using ASP.NET for the user interface and SQL Server 2000 for data management, Denim Group created an information routing system that allows customers to create and update tickets, to view documents pertaining to their homes securely and to review the status of homes under construction.
Integration with existing external systems was key to the success of the effort. Customers accessed the system via a user database contained in the SQL Server, and employees using the system were authenticated via Active Directory. The system also pulled data related to construction status of homes from a legacy application. The system cleaned up the data, putting it into a format suitable for direct presentation to McMillin San Antonio customers. By leveraging these existing systems, Denim Group was able to prevent duplication of data as well as reduce the level of effort required to get the system into production.
ROI Statement
The new program introduced a "self-serve" aspect for customers to access frequently requested information and documents. Not only does this save customers time and aggravation, it frees up staff time, allowing staff members to be available for more urgent customer concerns. With the Denim Group solution, the process of responding to customer services queries is more efficient and saves both McMillin employees and customers time and effort.