Eckoh, a UK developer of speech recognition solutions for customer service centers, has expanded its three-year contract with Utilita Group to include mobile phone payment capabilities.

The new service will enables Utilita’s customers to purchase electricity or gas via SMS. The EckohPAY product handles payments in a PCI compliant manner, and can be deployed through speech, web, mobile and smartphone applications.

Utilita is an independent UK company, licensed by Ofgem and Ofcom to supply gas and electricity. Utilita customers that have pre-pay meters can purchase electricity or gas using the EckohPAY SMS service. Customers register their mobile number online and when they want to “top-up,” they send an SMS message with their electric or gas card number and the amount they wish to pay to a dedicated shortcode. Once the details are validated and authorised, the customer is issued a code to activate the purchased electricity or gas.

“Following the successful launch of Eckoh’s web payment solution last year, we were keen to work with them to expand the scope of services offered to our customers. With this new mobile payment facility, our customers have another convenient and secure method for purchasing their electricity or gas, and we expect to add further services during the course of our contract,” said  Bill Bullen, Managing Director and Founder of Utilita.

Nik Philpot, Chief Executive Officer of Eckoh, added,  “We are delighted that Utilita have chosen to adopt Eckoh’s mobile payment solution, and this demonstrates the value that our EckohPAY solution has already delivered them. This new agreement shows the breadth of Eckoh’s offering – covering speech, web, mobile and smartphone applications – which enables our clients to increase customer satisfaction through enhancing consumer choice and convenience whilst improving operational efficiency.”

Source: Business Wire