Singapore Telecommunications : Singtel wins Best Retail Concept of the Year Award from SRA

Accolade recognises digital transformation of Singtel's flagship store

Singapore, 1 October 2018 - Singtel won the Best Retail Concept of the Year Award at the recent Singapore Retailers Association (SRA) Retail Awards 2018 in recognition of its revamped flagship store at Comcentre and its innovative use of advanced retail technologies.

The new store concept seamlessly combines online and offline customer touch points by integrating online and in-store shopping carts. Other innovative features include a smart WiFi-based queue system, 24x7 self-serve kiosks where customers can pick up SIM cards, pay bills or top up prepaid cards as well as automated checkouts linked to e-wallets, firsts in Singapore's retail industry. The SRA award is the third accolade won by Singtel since the store was re-opened in January 2018. Earlier this year, Telecom Asia and the Singapore Business Review also lauded Singtel for giving customers an innovative omni-channel shopping experience.

'We are honoured to be recognised by SRA for our efforts to digitally transform our flagship store at Comcentre,' said Mr Yuen Kuan Moon, CEO of Consumer Singapore and Chief Digitalisation Officer at Singtel. 'While our customers are increasingly choosing online channels, there are many who still prefer to visit our physical stores to be served by a sales consultant in person and to try out devices before they make their purchases. Our transformation seeks to give customers the best of both worlds by having a digitally augmented store that provides a highly personalised, omni-channel experience, such as interactive touch walls and a digital queue experience. We also have customer service robots moving around the shop to assist customers. This has seen store traffic rising 30 percent since the Comcentre shop revamp.'

Singtel has in the last few years overhauled the way it engages and serves customers, whose lifestyles have gone increasingly digital due to the proliferation of mobile devices. For example, the MySingtel app has been enhanced to enable customers to routinely buy roaming packages, subscribe to value-added services, as well as pay their bills on their mobile devices. In Singapore, about 22 percent of all Singtel consumer sales transactions are now done online.

Singtel call centre operations have also been digitalised, with about 61 percent of all customer care transactions now done on a self-help basis. By using technologies such as visual IVR or interactive voice response as well as virtual and live chat agents, customers no longer have to wait to talk to Singtel's call centre agents.

'Our digitalisation efforts have raised staff productivity and generated positive feedback from our customers, with customer experience scores as high as 97 percent,' said Mr Yuen. 'Given these encouraging results, we will continue to double down on our digitalisation efforts.'

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