Carphone Warehouse 2016 Annual Report Download - page 17

Dixons Carphone plc Annual Report and Accounts 2015/16
Strategic Report
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3. Drive our service proposition: We need to be able to stand
shoulder to shoulder with our customers and for them to
know they can come to our stores and get knowledgeable
advice and great service to help them buy the right
product. They need to be confident that we will solve their
problem quickly and efficiently. Geek Squad in the UK &
Ireland and Knowhow in the UK & Ireland and in the
Nordics offer customers services and technical support
that can help them with their product throughout its
lifetime. This is expanded in our second strategic priority.
4. Reduce costs: The scale of our operations across stores,
ranges, logistics, distribution, repairs and services means
that we can continually improve processes to reduce
costs. We have removed a considerable amount of cost
from the business over the last few years by making the
business simpler, easier to operate and more efficient; we
remain relentlessly focused on managing costs to make
our business more efficient. One of our principal priorities
in the coming year for improving cost efficiency is the
implementation of our UK & Ireland property plan. The
programme will, from 2017/18, result in a c. £20 million per
annum reduction in our operating costs as a result of
lower leasing costs.
2. Leverage our scale, our knowhow,
and our unique infrastructure to
drive growth in new product areas
including growth in services
We continue to expand and strengthen our proposition to
customers, our service capability and our relationship with
suppliers to underpin and drive even greater advantage in the
markets in which we operate.
Growing complexity and interconnectivity of products means
that customers are increasingly demanding help and support,
not just in choosing the right product, but also installation,
connection, support and repair. Our Geek Squad and
Knowhow services are at the forefront of this in the UK and we
have introduced our Knowhow services across the Nordics.
We must continue to innovate new services to help customers
and to remain relevant to the way products and connectivity is
evolving. Behind our end-to-end service operation we have a
comprehensive infrastructure, including technical phone
support, delivery, installation, repair and recycling. We can
leverage this infrastructure to widen our customer base either
to customers who bought their products through a third party
(for example, our fault&fix computer service), or for business
customers. By doing this we can increase the efficiency of
using this infrastructure and deliver even better value services
to our customers.
3. Continue to develop the Connected
World Services model and establish
it as a material contributor to
earnings
Connected Retailing
We successfully completed a trial of opening and operating
Sprint stores in the US, resulting in the creation of a Connected
Retail joint venture and the agreement to roll out 500 stores
over the next three years. We have developed a new, more
cost-efficient in-store format with an intended roll-out of at
least three per week over the next 12 months. In addition, as
part of our IP work stream we have taken over the operation
of 27 Sprint-owned stores in Miami and Dallas and we are
investigating opportunities to create value from OEM partners,
online optimisation and store productivity improvements. We
have a highly experienced team based in Kansas managing the
operation on a day-to-day basis to ensure the full potential of
the agreement is reached. We are working to identify our next
Connected Retail partner, focusing on high value markets with
competitive carrier environments.
Support and Services
We are now the second largest third-party provider of mobile
phones insurance in the UK, reaching agreement with RBS to
provide ongoing mobile device insurance administration and
winning new business with EE and TalkTalk. The Dixons
Carphone Merger has given us the opportunity to broaden
our scope of services still further, enabling us to now provide
a unique and differentiated proposition throughout the mobile
value chain. With the emergence of connectivity in more
industries, the UK market is continuing to grow and increase
in complexity. As a result we have identified a strong
opportunity pipeline.
honeyBee software
honeyBee, branded Pin Point in Dixons Carphone, has been
transformational within our stores, processing over 250m
customer journeys and achieving class-leading customer
satisfaction scores. Work is now progressing to expand its use
into new categories and across all brands. Excellent progress
has also been made in securing honeyBee software contracts
in the US, with deals signed with Sprint and a leading device
manufacturer, in addition to existing agreements in the UK,
Canada and Germany. The honeyBee proposition of
simplifying the delivery and management of complex digital
customer journeys has resonated well across several industries
and we now have an active pipeline in the Travel, General
Retail and Finance sectors, alongside significant opportunities
in our mobile heartland. To achieve global scale quickly and
access new industry verticals, we have agreed a channel
distribution deal with Accenture that utilises their in-market
client teams across the world to drive honeyBee sales in all
relevant industries.
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