Momentum Energy - the only independent electricity retailer in Victoria to specialise in small to medium business customers - is entering an exciting new phase of growth following an investment by Australia’s leading renewable energy business - Hydro Tasmania.
 
Having already achieved an average growth of over 200% over the last three years, the investment from Hydro Tasmania will enable Momentum to continue and accelerate their growth as a renewable energy leader.
 
Momentum have selected Sage to implement the reconciliation modules of their flagship product – Sage EMS – to ensure that Momentum’s bottom line is protected during this new phase of rapid growth.
 
Sage EMS NEMMCO Reconciliation and Settlements support ensures that pool payments are correct, by ensuring that all parties to the settlement are working from the same set of configuration and metering data.
 
Sage EMS NUoS Reconciliation and Settlements support ensures that LNSP invoices are correct, automatically identifying and rectifying any discrepancies, and ensuring that NUoS Charges invoiced by LNSP are correct and recoverable from customer bills.
 
Sage EMS Revenue Assurance ensures customer billing is correct, ensuring that energy, network and other charges on customer bills match those charges being received by a retailer from NEMMCO and LNSPs, and that customers are not being inaccurately billed.  It helps to eliminate unbilled revenue and unauthorised usage.
 
Sage is helping to protect Momentum Energy’s bottom line.
 
How can Sage - and our systems - help you?

New energy retailer ERM has powered into its second year by trumping rivals to become one of Queensland’s top three corporate power retailers, making a substantial profit in its first year of operations.

The company announced that it has contracted over eight thousand gigawatt hours of electricity worth more than $500 million since it began marketing in late 2007.

ERM billed its first customers in January 2008.

ERM Power Retail CEO Mitch Anderson said "We made a conscious decision not to compete for household or small business customers. There was clearly a widening gap in the market, and that it was at the large corporate end, where customers can spend anywhere from $50,000 to $60 million a year on electricity.”

ERM’s new formula has paid off, with the company winning some of Australia’s most prized energy contracts, including QR, Brisbane Airport Corporation, Queensland Alumina, Pfizer Australia, Bunnings, Allied Mills, and Collins Food Group (KFC & Sizzler) to name a few.

“Billing errors, delays and service inflexibility are some of the concerns expressed by corporate and industrial energy users.”

ERM recruited a who’s who of the electricity industry to design and build a retailer and engaged Sage to deliver systems purpose-built for large energy consumers.

“We have purpose-built billing, operations and trading systems, designed to support the flexibility and accuracy that very large users need. It is a world-class set-up,” he said.

Sage has delivered industry leading capabilities to ERM.  How can Sage - and our systems - help you?

Sage is a Silver Sponsor of Metering Australia 2008 and Billing/CRM Australia 2008, being held at Hilton on the Park, Melbourne from November 18 to November 20.

Sage will be presenting at the conference, sharing our experience with ERM Power helping them to achieve billing results that would be the envy of most, if not all, C&I retailers, using techniques that are becoming applicable to the mass market with the roll-out of interval metering.

We will also be exhibiting at the conference, demonstrating our flagship product Sage EMS.

ERM Power Retail has become one of the fastest growing retailers in only six months, and continues to deliver outstanding customer service to its rapidly growing customer base.

Since going live with Sage EMS in January, ERM have continued to win the business of many large, premium customers, and to deliver accurate and timely billing.

Steve Rogers, General Manager Retail Operations, said "Billing is continuing to go smoothly  - we are now billing more than 99.8% of revenue on day one.  MDP data issues on the remaining sites prevent us from billing all customers on day one.”  Steve added "Customers are paying on time – as for billing, 99.8% of revenue is received on time.  No account is more than 30 days overdue.”

Mitch Anderson, Chief Executive - ERM Power Retail, commented "Managing Cash Flow is vitally important, and as we grow, we’re continuing to ensure that we don’t face unexpected cash flow issues due to billing problems.”

Sage has the experience and capability to help you to improve your efficiency in the NEM, and can deliver point solutions as well as integrated solutions that will provide a rapid return on investment and generate ongoing savings. Contact Sage for more information.

Sage today announces the general availability of Billing for their flagship product Sage EMS.

Sage EMS now offers a full C&I Retail & Billing Solution, including transfers, meter data management, billing, receipting, receivables, and associated reporting.

As you would expect for a Billing solution targeted at high-end Commercial & Industrial customers, Sage EMS Billing supports both individual and consolidated billing, retail only billing (where customers are billed directly by the network for NUoS charges), and complex billing including pool pass through billing, environmental charges, market, metering and pass through charges, for example.

Sophisticated customers are supported with detailed charge basis breakdowns, comprehensive demand reporting, and, of course, bills that are compliant with regulatory requirements such as greenhouse gas reporting, non-energy charges (e.g. Queensland Ambulance Levy), etc.

Full customer account receivables management is included, including automatic processing of customer payments, payable aging and dunning, customer account statements etc.

Financial transactions are exported to financials systems (including receivables, receipts, payables (e.g. NEMMCO and NUoS charges), with a flexible mapping approach allowing transactions to be exported to financials based on existing financial system account structures.

Customer data is integrated with existing CRM solutions (and fully visible within EMS) - or Sage can supply a Microsoft Dynamics CRM solution tailored to your requirements.

Sage has the experience and capability to help you to improve your efficiency in the NEM, and can deliver point solutions as well as integrated solutions that will provide a rapid return on investment and generate ongoing savings. Contact Sage for more information.

ERM Power Retail has successfully billed its first set of customers with Sage EMS.

ERM Power Retail has promised its customers that it offers "flexible, and easy to read bills" and that “reliability and accuracy is assured”, and Sage have ensured that they have delivered on this promise.

Less than three months after signing a contract with Sage to implement Sage EMS, ERM's first retail customers transferred, and Sage EMS started managing the customer billing and metering data on January 1st. On February 1st, ERM was ready to bill for January.

Dave Harvey, Manager Billing and Data said "It gives me great pleasure to advise that ERM’s first bill run resulted in 97% of the total receivables being billed on day 1 (only MDP data issues on the remaining sites stopped us from achieving a full compliment). Thanks to all those involved especially Ben Ernst and the Sage team". The remaining customers billed the very next day.

Sage has the experience and capability to help you to improve your efficiency in the NEM, and can deliver point solutions as well as integrated solutions that will provide a rapid return on investment and generate ongoing savings. Contact Sage for more information.

ERM Power has selected Sage to implement Sage EMS to operate their retail business.

ERM Power has been in business for over 25 years and is Australia's leading privately owned energy solution specialist, with over $2 billion in generation projects in operation or under development. ERM is entering the electricity retail market after many years developing, constructing & operating gas-fired electricity generation.

Sage was selected following a detailed evaluation of the existing solutions in the Australian Market which commenced in June 2007.

Following Sage receiving preferred vendor status in August, we have worked with ERM to finalise specifications and requirements, and commence development and integration.

Sage has put in place a program of work to integrate Sage EMS with ERM's CRM and financial systems, and will deliver an integrated solution as ERM enters the retail market.

Sage has the experience and capability to help you to improve your efficiency in the NEM, and can deliver point solutions as well as integrated solutions that will provide a rapid return on investment and generate ongoing savings. Contact Sage for more information.

Sage has recently completed implementation of Sage EMS for Origin Energy, and has entered into a contract to support Origin as AIM approaches for Victoria.

Following their purchase of the Sun Retail business, Origin Energy conducted a review of Sun Retail systems as part of their program to integrate Sun Retail into Origin Energy.

Following a detailed review, Origin chose to implement Sage EMS to manage meter data and settlements.

Sage put in place a program of work to integrate Sage EMS into Origin's business and technical environment, and delivered a dramatically faster and more detailed settlement capability to Origin to manage settlements for all Origin Participants.

Following a period of running both old and new systems in parallel, Origin has now decomissioned the old system, and is relying on Sage EMS to manage settlements for both Queensland and existing Origin particpants.

Sage has the experience and capability to help you to improve your efficiency in the NEM, and can deliver point solutions as well as integrated solutions that will provide a rapid return on investment and generate ongoing savings Contact Sage for more information.

Origin Energy - having aquired the Sun Retail business from the Queensland Goverment - has chosen to implement Sage EMS to manage its metering and settlements processes.

Sage was in the process of implementing our EMS product for Sun Retail to manage their metering and settlement processes, as part of their program to prepare for FRC, due to commence in Queensland on 1 July 2007.

Following their purchase of the Sun Retail business, Origin Energy conducted a review of Sun Retail systems as part of their program to integrate Sun Retail into Origin Energy.

Following a detailed review, Origin has chosen to implement Sage EMS to manage meter data and settlements.

Sage has put in place a program of work to integrate Sage EMS into Origin's business and technical environment, and will deliver a settlement capability to Origin in time to manage the initial settlements for Queensland FRC.

Both Sage and Origin have experienced the turburlent times associated with the commencement of FRC in other jurisdictions: with Sage EMS in place, Origin is well placed to manage settlement risk more effectively than ever before.

Sage has the experience and capability to help you to improve your efficiency in the NEM, and can deliver point solutions as well as integrated solutions that will provide a rapid return on investment and generate ongoing savings. Contact Sage for more information.

Sage Utility Systems has been selected by Energex to provide a Metering, Market Configuration and MSATS solution for Sun Retail - the independent retailer being separated from Energex and sold by the Queensland Government in a trade sale.

Sage will implement its fourth generation solution – Sage EMS – to provide Sun Retail with a robust, cost effective solution. Sage EMS will allow Sun Retail to prepare for and enter FRC with a solution that manages settlement risk efficiently, as well as delivering benefits relating to meter data management and MSATS configuration management – new challenges that it faces as an independent retailer.

Highly automated, intelligent systems will allow Sun Retail to manage metering and settlement under FRC – even with approximately 400,000 customers transferring to PowerDirect Australia – without requiring dramatic increases in staff numbers to support settlement and metering processes.

Sage's experience in building & integrating metering, settlements & market configuration data systems, and our proven track record, combined with cost-effective delivery made us the obvious choice.

The implementation project will have an aggressive time-line – ready for FRC market testing and full FRC soon after. Sage has a reputation for on-time, on-budget implementations, and working with Energex, SPARQ, and Sun Retail, will make this project a success.

Sage has the experience and capability to help you to improve your efficiency in the NEM, and can deliver point solutions as well as integrated back office systems that will provide a rapid return on investment and generate ongoing savings. Contact Sage for more information.

It's "Billing as Usual" for Origin with interval metering.

Sage has assisted Origin Energy prepare for the 2008 roll-out of interval (smart) metering in Victoria by re-engineering metering support for billing residential customers who have interval metering installed.

Whilst the formal roll-out of interval metering is not due to commence until 2008, significant numbers of interval capable meters are already installed in the field.  Many of these were being read as basic meters, but more and more are being converted to be read as interval meters.

Residential customers are not yet ready for the complex billing that will eventually support demand-side management, and many simply want to see their usual "Peak & Off-Peak" style bills.

Sage has simplified the setup and maintenance activities for customers who already have interval meters installed, and for customers who's meters are being coverted to interval ahead of the 2008 roll-out.

The architecture supports both current tariffs and future tariff structures that are designed to take advantage of the flexibilty offered by interval metering.

Sage can assist you prepare for the interval metering roll-out, with surprisingly flexible and cost-effective options. Contact Sage for more information.

Sage Utility Systems announces its new Meter Data Management solution for the Australian Energy Utilities Market

About Sage EMS

Sage EMS – Energy Management Suite – is the first and only integrated suite of metering back office applications for the Australian Energy Market.

Sage EMS Components

Sage EMS comprises:

• Meter Data Management
• Configuration Management
• NEMMCO Settlement Reconciliation
• NUoS Settlement Reconciliation
• Billing Support
• Exception Management
• Comprehensive Analysis and Reporting

Sage EMS Customers

Sage EMS is an Australian Designed, Developed and Australian Owned suite developed specifically for participants in Australian Energy Markets.

Sage EMS is suitable for any participant – from the smallest independent retailer to the largest integrated utility.

Sage EMS is cost effective – inexpensive to purchase, inexpensive to implement and inexpensive to operate.

Sage EMS supports retailers (both as FRMP and LR), NSPs (as LNSP, MPB/C) and MDPs (as MDP, MPB/C) and provides support for specific roles such as RP.

Sage Utility Systems has completed the implementation of a highly automated solution for B2B for Meter Data for Origin Energy.

Development and initial implementation was completed back in July 2005 (in line with original B2B timelines), but the B2B component was not switched on until the official cutover on January 15^th.

Together with automated detection of missing and late meter readings, Sage has linked B2B requests for meter data to the exception system, allowing comprehensive automation and management of meter data flows for Origin.

The Sage NEM Validator lets you quickly validate large numbers of NEM12 and NEM13 files against the NEMMCO specification.

Uses

• To test meter data files being produced by MDP systems.
• To verify meter data files being received from MDP systems.
• To quickly create validation reports that can used when discussing formatting and validation issues with MDPs.

Features

• Extensive validation of NEM12 and NEM13 files.
• Can handle zipped files - no need to manually unzip.
• Can handle multiple files at once.
• No need to upload files one by one to Sage Online NEM Validator.
• Validation reports can be easily copied to Word or Email.
• Export results to CSV(Excel), Text, or XML.

NEMMCO has extensively utilised the Sage NEM Validator during it's testing of NEM12 and NEM13 files provided by MDPs to NEMMCO as part of the NEM12 / 13 Project.

NEMMCO has published sample files provided by MDPs as part of this project, for NEM participants to use in their testing processes.  The sample files, and supporting documents, are available on NEMMCO's website.

NEMMCO found that the Sage NEM Validator detected all problems in sample files except for two issues:

• The Validator did not report an error where the Previous Read Date was later than the Current Register Read Date.
• The validator did not report an error where the end-of-line delimiter in a file was not CR-LF as specified.

Sage has already updated the Validator to detect read date discrepancies - and the new version is now available less than one day after being notified of this issue by NEMMCO.

Sage is investigating options for reporting on the second issue, and will provide an update on this issue.

Sage is committed to working with the industry to ensure that the transition to NEM12 and NEM13 is as smooth as possible, and will continue to update the validator as required. 

The Sage NEM Validator has been extensively utilised by Meter Data Providers as part of their testing process prior to the introduction of the new NEM12 and NEM13 MDFF formats on July 20^th.

MDPs had been utilising the Sage NEM Validator consistently during April, with around 10 files validated per day during April.

However, with the due date (May 23^rd) for publication of offical sample files on the NEMMCO web site fast approaching, utilisation of the Sage NEM Validator has jumped, with around 20 files validated per day, and 60 files validated yesterday.

Sage can provide its NEM Validation technology to recipients of meter files for testing or production purposes, and can supply a version of the validator suitable for integration within B2B gateways for validation of NEM12 and NEM13 data received in a MeterDataNotification message.

The Sage NEM Validator is available as a web based service, a DLL, a web service, or can be licenced in source code format, if required.  For futher information, please contact Sage Utility Systems.

Sage Utility Systems launched it's NEM File Validator today.

Sage is upgrading Usage - Origin Energy's Metering System - to handle NEM12 and NEM13 data, and has independantly developed a NEM12 and NEM13 validation engine which it has made available - free of charge - to the Australian National Electricity Market (NEM)

Sage has been testing the NEM File Validator with sample files contained within the NEMMCO NEM12/NEM13 specification, and with files produced by an MDP who has been working with Origin Energy providing sample data.

The Sage NEM File Validator has allowed Origin Energy and the MDP to quickly identify issues with the sample files, and the MDP is now producing files that comply with the NEMMCO specification.

Sage hopes that the public release of this tool will allow the NEM industry to ensure that all participants - both those that produce MDFF files and those that receive them - have a common understanding and agreement of the interpretation of the NEMMCO specification.

Sage Utility Systems launched it's new web site today.

Sage specialises in systems for the Australian utilities industries, delivering systems that demonstrate outstanding performance, scalability, reliability, and that provide, quite simply, outstanding value for money.

Sage allows utilities to obtain far quicker returns on their capital expenditure, and reduce their operatation expenditure related to supporting key business systems.

Sage's web site will be progressively enhanced with additional details on Sage Products & Services, and information on how Sage can help utilities reduce their cost of serving customers.