The final day of 2006 was a harsh one for Nebraska’s utilities and their customers. A winter storm rendered 37 transmission lines belonging to the Nebraska Public Power District out of service due to ice, broken poles, toppled structures, and damaged electrical equipment.  Many of NPPD’s 76 wholesale power suppliers, especially those serving towns and rural areas in central and north central Nebraska, also battled disastrous conditions.

11,612 of the Nebraska Public Power District’s 100,000 customers lost power due to the storm.  NPPD had to institute a series of rolling blackouts in order to maintain the load coming into Kearney, NE. 

The utility was able to make use of Twenty First Century’s Universal Communication System (UCS) to contact their customers and make them aware of the blackouts, so that they could plan ahead and ensure their comfort and safety.

On January 03, 2007 NPPD sent four separate call-out campaigns, reaching 6280 customers through 17,156 attempts made over a 24-hour period. When NPPD’s calls were met with busy signals, operator intercepts, and no-answers, UCS performed a number of re-tries, in order to reach as many people as possible.

The message played was "Nebraska Public Power District, your electric power supplier, has suffered extensive damage as a result of a recent winter storm. You are included in a group of customers who will incur a temporary service interruption as a result of our restoration process. This restoration process could take a couple of days to complete. Please expect to be without power starting at (date and time inserted). You may incur up to a six-hour outage. Contact NPPD at 1-877-275-6773 if you have questions or concerns. We appreciate your understanding and apologize for the inconvenience."

The NPPD Call Center was staffed with extra personnel during the storm period to provide its customers with outstanding service. Along with answering incoming calls with live agents, Twenty First Century’s Inbound call handling service was also used to handle calls and provide information.

Twenty First Century Communications is proud to serve the Nebraska Public Power District with both UCS and High Volume Call Answering (HVCA®). NPPD has been a client since 2004.