It is quite common to witness obstruction to migration activities of any enterprise system from all corners of the organization. When a critical enterprise function like billing is the process that is to be migrated, the hindrance, indecision and anxiety levels are even higher. Risks of disruption, hefty costs, and potential customer dissatisfaction owing to failed migration initiatives are cited as the key reasons behind the indecision. However, over years, it has been found that certain myths surrounding legacy billing migration are the real reasons behind unfavorable responses to a question of migration.
Let us debunk the top 6 myths about legacy billing migration by exploring the real facts behind them:
Myth: Billing migrations are complex and consume significant time and resources
Fact: Billing migrations are an easy task if your business has a well-planned migration roadmap, access to the right tools, and guidance from experts in the field. A migration exercise for an important enterprise application like a billing solution requires collaborative participation from different departments or stakeholders. Having the right program management skills and fostering tool-based automation of reconciliation post-migration can create a smooth experience overall. Creating a planned roadmap to migrate the billing solution can be a tough endeavor, but it is critical to avoid pitfalls further down the line when the actual execution of the initiative happens. While migration activities often fall under the ambit of digital transformation initiatives in an organization, it is important to segregate the activity and give it a stand-alone priority. This eliminates several complexities associated with large digital transformation exercises, and tech teams can focus on the migration activity alone.
Myth: Migration is just a data transfer initiative from one system to another
Fact: Data transfer or movement is just a small part of the migration exercise. Migrating from a legacy billing solution has far-reaching objectives that impact multiple business units, partners, and even customers. A migration exercise calls for the transformation of redundant, outdated, and manual-intensive processes, the introduction of new workflows and channels from the new solution, the elimination of stagnant technology that obstructed innovation, and much more. A migration initiative can even result in the transfer of control between departments as automated functionalities in the new system can relieve manual efforts needed across several areas and re-assign human resources accordingly.
Myth: Data mapping is the key pillar for a successful migration initiative
Fact: The biggest indicator of success for a migration exercise is the ease with which end-users can leverage the new solution. Any new billing system you bring in will have its own pre-built processes, workflows, and operational architecture. To make it easier for end-users to use the system, it is important to be able to map the inherent processes of the billing operations into the new system. Users should not be left with a new solution that has missed out on a functional capability. It may have a new process to achieve the same functionality, but it is critical to make users aware of the mapping that has been done at the process level rather than just at the data level.
Myth: Migration activities are technical initiatives with minimal functional intervention
Fact: The ownership of a billing migration exercise often lies with the IT team. But as explained earlier, the success of the migration exercise depends on how well the end-users can perform their jobs with the new system. Hence, it requires more functional validation and involvement from non-technical staff during the migration phase. They have a say in defining new process architecture, workflow customizations, data mapping, and much more. Their strategic inputs can be used while planning both pre-migration and post-migration activities.
Myth: Source data needs to be structured for successful migration
Fact: Even if the need for structured source data is important, it is nearly impossible to expect the same from any legacy system and billing solutions are no exception. But the good news is that nearly every major vendor for modern billing solutions understands this problem and they expect their offering to be deployed in a setting where data structuring was never a priority before. The best practice recommended by them to solve this challenge is to cleanse the data as much as possible using a range of tools and processes or undertake data transformation initiatives post-migration and keep a clearly documented record of the gaps between the old and newly transformed data sets. This will help in resolving any discrepancies that may arise over time due to any data integrity issues.
Myth: Migration can be the first activity on the new system
Fact: Before proceeding with the migration activity, it is critical to ensure that the new system runs fine and can handle all operational scenarios within the business. Therefore, the target billing system must be first validated with test data inputs, and its output verified for successful transactional behavior. When the new system can successfully run the billing operations encompassing all possible operational scenarios independently, then you can proceed with migrating from the existing system to the new solution. However, as a best practice, it is advisable to run both in parallel for some time before retiring the old solution. This helps in educating users to make a gradual move from the old system and discover any mismatched scope or coverage issues while in operations.
A legacy billing migration exercise should never be downrated by believing in myths surrounding the same. The consequences of not upgrading from legacy technology can be severe. From the facts we have deciphered around the myths, it is clear that, once an enterprise has a stable plan and roadmap along with the right tools, migrating a legacy billing solution to a modern and state-of-the-art billing platform is quite easy. All you need is the right guidance and advisory on tools, processes, and best practices to navigate the migration journey without disruptions. Get in touch with us to know more.
