BT 2010 Annual Report Download - page 13

11BT GROUP PLC ANNUAL REPORT & FORM 20-F
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION FINANCIAL STATEMENTS REPORT OF THE DIRECTORS REVIEW OF THE YEAR OVERVIEW
REVIEW OF THE YEAR
This is the Annual Report for the year ended 31 March 2010. It
complies with UK regulations and is the Annual Report on Form
20-F for the US Securities and Exchange Commission to meet US
regulations. This Annual Report has been sent to shareholders who
have elected to receive a copy. A separate summary financial
statement & notice of meeting 2010 has been issued to
shareholders who have elected to receive a shorter document. Both
documents are available on the company’s website, www.bt.com
In this Annual Report, references to ‘BT Group’, ‘BT’, ‘the group’,
‘the company’, ‘we’ or ‘our’ are to BT Group plc (which includes the
continuing activities of British Telecommunications plc) and its
subsidiaries and lines of business, internal service units, or any of
them as the context may require.
References to ‘a year’ are to the financial year ended 31 March of
that year, e.g. ‘2010’ refers to the year ended 31 March 2010,
except in relation to our fibre-based broadband roll out plans which
are based on calendar years, not financial years. Unless otherwise
stated, all non financial statistics are at 31 March 2010. Please see
cautionary statement regarding forward-looking statements on
page 156.
Denotes non financial targets. Being a responsible and
sustainable business is integral to the way we work. Our non
financial key performance indicators measure our progress. These
also include direct costs to BT related to our environmental and
social performance, in line with the principles of the connected
reporting framework.
Who we are
BT is one of the world’s leading communications services
companies, serving the needs of customers in the UK and in more
than 170 countries.
OUR BUSINESS AND STRATEGY
Our business and strategy
Who we are
What we do
Our aim
Our strategic priorities
How we measure our progress
2010 outlook
2011 outlook and future plans
What we do
Our main activities are the provision of fixed lines, broadband,
mobile and TV products and services as well as networked IT
services.
In the UK we are the largest communications services provider,
serving the consumer, business and public sector markets. Globally,
we supply networked IT services to multinational corporations,
domestic businesses and government departments. We also
provide access to our network and services to more than 1,000
communications providers (CPs) in the UK and others worldwide.
Our aim
Our aim is to drive shareholder value by making BT a better
business with a better future.
Three areas - customer service delivery, cost transformation and
investing for the future – are essential building blocks to making BT
a better business. They are linked: the better we serve our
customers, the less time and money we spend on reworking and
fixing faults. By continuing to transform our cost base, we open up
new opportunities to invest in BT’s future.
We are committed to acting as a responsible business for
shareholders, customers, suppliers and our people, developing
innovative solutions that both benefit society and support our
long-term development. Investing in the communities in which we
operate and driving down our CO2emissions are critical parts of this
commitment.
Customer service delivery
Every part of BT is taking action to make substantial improvements
to the delivery of our services by putting our customers at the heart
of everything we do.
This means keeping our promises to our customers, being easy to
contact and straightforward to deal with, keeping customers
informed, and taking action to address the reasons why they
complain.
We track the real experience of our customers from start to finish,
and will remove duplication and inefficiency to drive down service
provision time.
We have significantly reduced failures, faults and complaints over
the past year and will invest in training, systems and better
processes to continue this improvement. In the last year, we have
reduced business and consumer complaints by 50% and 33%,
respectively.
Cost transformation
We continue our drive to reduce costs across our business and
deliver absolute levels of cost reduction. During 2010, our cost
transformation activities have delivered a step change in the cost
base of our business, with a reduction of £1,752m in total
underlying operating costs and capital expenditure. All of our lines
of business and internal service units have made a contribution to
the delivery of these savings. See Transforming our cost base on
page 44 for further analysis.
Savings have been delivered from targeted cost reduction
programmes which focus on eliminating the cost of failure across
the group, an overhead value analysis programme which provides a
structured approach to reducing costs on a project-by-project
basis, and process re-engineering which reviews processes end-to-