CONFÍA, streamlining services for vulnerable people

Energy sustainability happens when nobody is left behind. To achieve this goal, technology can be very useful. In collaboration with Malaga City Council, the University of Malaga and Alastria and with funding from the Andalusia Technological Corporation (CTA), we have launched CONFÍA , a pioneering project in Europe that streamlines the flow of information between retailers and the administration through blockchain.

The CONFÍA project will help to improve efficiency in managing vulnerable customers by municipality, thus avoiding power outages due to non-payment. It will also make it possible to better connect and provide the same information in real time to all those involved (retailers, regional communities, city councils, social services, intervention and the National Financial Markets and Competition Commission).

Blockchain technology consists of a distributed, secure database (thanks to encryption) that can be applied to all types of transactions, protecting their security and privacy and guaranteeing information in real time to the various stakeholders involved. 

“Blockchain can ease procedures in a reliable, transparent, secure and decentralised way so that vulnerable people do not get cut off" explains José Mínguez, Head of Market Innovation at Endesa. Thanks to CONFÍA, government agencies can detect users in vulnerable situations more quickly, so that social services can process the aid available under current legislation.

Currently, managing consumers who cannot afford to pay their electricity bill is a decentralised and non-automated process, so it is very slow and inefficient. Until now, a centralised system that handles the entire process was not viable, since the information being processed is extremely sensitive and no one part of the process owns all the information.

Blockchain technology enables decentralised information storage, which guarantees information confidentiality and security (pursuant to the GPDR and the Right to Be Forgotten), increases the efficiency of the entire process thanks to its automation and enables new stakeholders to be added to the system.

Commitment to customers

Endesa is committed to innovation throughout the value chain by introducing new technologies that improve service to customers. The CONFÍA project is part of the Company's commitment to serving customers who are in a vulnerable situation. Since 2014, ENDESA has signed a number of agreements with local and regional community governments and social sector entities to avoid cutting off the supply to customers with energy poverty status who are certified by the social services, while emergency aid is processed for the payment of these consumers' electricity or gas bills.

There are presently more than 270 agreements in effect, six of them with regional communities, five with municipality federations and the rest with city councils and associations. Thanks to all these agreements, protection can be provided to 100% of the most vulnerable customers.

The experiment in Malaga will be used as a pilot scheme and, if successful, can be replicated in other Spanish towns and cities.