On 16 and 17 April, two seminars entitled “Innovations in the integrated water service management: from meter reading to debt collection in a single solution” were held in the Municipalities of Pozzallo and Giarre, organised by Sikuel, a software house of the Maggioli Group, with the participation of other companies in the group, APKAPPA and Maggioli Tributi.
After the institutional greetings from the mayor Roberto Ammatuna, during the event held at the Spazio Cultura in Pozzallo, and Angelo D’Anna, the mayor of Giarre, at the meeting held in the Etna municipality, the work got underway.
The integrated solution, presenting to public managers, councillors and private aqueduct operators, it combines Sikuel's management and web software with APKAPPA's remote reading technological solutions, completing the offering with Maggioli Tributi's compulsory collection service.
“Italy is a world leader in remote reading – it's the comment of Angelo Bianchi, CEO of APKAPPA – a system that allows any equipped meter to send its consumption data to software, in real-time and in a completely automated way, thanks to the use of modern, standard and open technologies. This system allows operators to enhance the service for their customers, speeding up processes and eliminating reading errors, optimising costs and increasing the quality of their staff's work. A choice that looks to the future, to innovation and to change. We have launched SMAQ® on the market, the plug&play remote reading system that transmits data over a 5G network with NB-IoT™ technology.
SMAQ® can be applied to any brand and model of meter, provided it is configured for remote reading and capable of overcoming any physical barriers that may exist in data communication. The SMAQ® solution – concludes Angelo Bianchi – integrates with Sikuel's K-WATER® software, which can receive periodic reading information from SMAQ®, monitor consumption, and detect alarms for presumed leaks and fraud.”
The highlights of the administrative management of integrated water services according to ARERA's provisions were illustrated by Orazio Distefano, Chief Executive Officer of Sikuel, a company that provides water service managers with twenty years of field experience, offering software solutions and a range of support services and activities for compliance with the Authority of Regulation for Energy Networks and Environment.
Distefano began with an overview of the new deposit, and the UI1, UI2 and UI3 components.
“With resolution 655 of 2015 – He remembered Horace Distefano – the manager is obliged to list all services they can provide, thus taking responsibility in case of delays and non-delivery which leads to compensation payment to the user, which is applied in the following bill. Also in the same resolution, the billing frequency is redesigned and the concept of transparency comes to the fore.”.
However, with resolution 218 of 2016, the reading of consumption was regulated.“Resolution 665 of 2017 – Distefano continued – reclassifies the various intakes into resident domestic, condominium and non-resident domestic and introduces the concept of consumption bands. Non-domestic intakes are also classified, highlighting those that can be shut off, such as hospitals, educational institutions, nursing homes, and prisons. Resolution 217 of 2017 establishes specific and general technical standards for aqueducts, sewerage, and purification.”.
Valid support for these regulations to be respected is guaranteed by the data cleansing and normalisation services and by Sikuel's electronic mailing.
The first allows for consistently up-to-date data, with a new classification of non-domestic users highlighting those that cannot be disconnected for non-payment. It also enables the historical recording of bonuses and ensures data exchange with Sgate (the energy tariff concessions management system). The K-posting system, on the other hand, is the web solution that addresses the need to manage the entire electronic invoicing process.
To complete the cycle, from consumption acquisition to post-invoicing, the integrated solution It is completed with the enforcement collection service, thanks to the CityMat software platform from Maggioli Tributi, a system of software products and services that allows the management of the entire lifecycle of a local authority's revenue, right through to collection. A service that supports authorities through the acquisition and management of charge lists, the issuing and registration of acts and injunctions, the conduct of precautionary and enforcement procedures, as well as remittance and reporting to authorities, and an out-of-court collection service: a process facilitated by the use of a database management system. A multitude of databases belonging to the municipality, or which the municipality can acquire by agreement from the Revenue Agency or other authorities, can be uploaded to this system. In this way, payment or a declaration of unenforceability is reached within 18 months, thus avoiding the very long times to which administrations are accustomed.
So a single player, the Maggioli Group’s booth, present throughout the national territory today, to ensure an effective and efficient service that translates into significant savings opportunities for integrated water service operators and, therefore, for consumers of this precious resource.
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