Article

Q&A: Wincor U.S. services VP talks strategic partnerships, service coverage

David Nottingham talks about why focusing on and investing in the services division is important.

August 2, 2011 by Kim Williams — Reporter, NetWorld Alliance

As head of the Wincor Nixdorf U.S. services division, David Nottingham's position centers around improving service processes, organizational alignment and customer satisfaction.

ATMmarketplace talks with Nottingham about the services business, and its philosophy on strategic partnerships, how technicians are assigned to accounts and investments into the business.

Before coming to the U.S., Nottingham was the service manager for Wincor operations in Ireland.

The following responses have been edited for brevity and clarity.

How big is Wincor Nixdorf's service business; how many technicians are employed?

Globally, Wincor Nixdorf manages 34 Customer Care Centers (CCCs) and more than 3500 technicians and engineers. The U.S. services organization has a widespread presence of approximately 800 people, with the majority of them located in the field close to our customer locations where they can respond quickly and efficiently to our customers.

How many states does the U.S. services organization cover?

Our service organization is nationwide, servicing 49 of the top 50 metropolitan statistical areas in the U.S.

Is the service business internally operated or is Wincor Nixdorf subcontracting the business to an outside vendor?

As our business develops and our customers deploy more sophisticated technologies throughout their networks, we realized that to ensure we can quickly deliver consistent level of services, we will partner with established and industry experienced organizations to deliver specific service activities.

A good example of this is our relationship with FedEx. The partnership allows Wincor Nixdorf to maintain parts inventories throughout the extensive network of 24-hour FedEx Kinko’s Office and Print Centers across the country, establishing forward stocking outlets in all Wincor Nixdorf service areas and strengthening Wincor technicians’ ability to repair an ATM or POS system at a moment’s notice.

Is Wincor Nixdorf bringing technicians from other Wincor countries and Germany to assist with the service business?

Whenever Wincor Nixdorf develops or introduces a new solution suite or concept, the development teams will support all of the regional and country requirements to ensure the technology is acceptable and ready for their respective markets. The development specialists will travel to deliver education and training programs to up-skill all management and field engineering trainers and also monitor initial customer installations. 

How many technicians are assigned to major accounts, such as JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Wells Fargo & Co.?

One thing about the design of Wincor Nixdorf products is that throughout our product portfolio our components are the same. This makes it easy for one technician to manage different customer networks at the same time. This allows us the opportunity to manage all of our clients -- big, medium and small -- based on the level of service agreed, machine distribution and geography. For example, a service technician may only work on machines owned by a single customer in a given area or may work on the equipment of many different customers in a single geographic area.

How many calls does Wincor Nixdorf's service department receive per day?

Globally, our call centers handle in excess of 2 million calls per annum. Currently, Wincor Nixdorf U.S. only services its own machines, but we have the capability and bandwidth to manage multi-vendor estates. As our clients begin to enjoy the benefits of a multi-vendor infrastructure, especially in banking where this has been made possible by the introduction of multi-vendor software, like our PC/E offering, the opportunity is open for our customer to have a greater choice of services supplier.

What do the field technicians do during a service call?

When our technicians attend a system call, we strive to maximize first time fix and minimize any chance of a repeat call. We also perform preventative maintenance activities while we are there to ensure future calls are minimized.

How much is being invested in the service business?

Our strength lies in our ability to innovate – it is for this reason why approximately 10 percent of our people are employed in R&D. Every year we invest over 4 percent of our annual turnover back into the business. This is not only in the development of our hardware and software, but in the advancement of our systems and processes that are the foundation of our services offering.

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