Product Feature - Streamline with Direct Carrier Billing

As Telcos increasingly lean into OTT as a way to differentiate themselves from competition, increase customer loyalty and unlock new revenue streams, we at Simplestream continue to look for new ways to enhance our App Platform to support our customers in the Telecommunications industry. One such feature which we will be examining today is our Direct Carrier Billing functionality.

With a range of options for Telcos as to how they want to take full advantage of the new OTT revolution, be it with a free service that then offers premium content either on a channel basis, as in our previous Feature article, or with TVOD content or a straight subscription model; the decisions regarding billing are always pivotal. That’s why we at Simplestream have focused on adding integration with Telcos for direct carrier billing.

This means our partners are able to offer their customers the ability to seamlessly add bills to their phone bill. Whether it’s a channel pack or renting a movie or upgrading a subscription the customer can choose to add the bill to their existing phone plan, immediately accessing the content and adding the bill to their monthly charge creating a totally frictionless environment.

It is also a popular feature for non-telco customers to integrate with popular Telcos in their target markets. This can be especially useful in developing markets where mobile consumption is prevalent due to better mobile infrastructure, especially as 5G becomes increasingly common; where phones are turning into “virtual wallets” with phone credit being used as a type of digital currency.