CONTACT INFORMATION

SPL WorldGroup, Inc.
www.splwg.com
800-275- 4775

MORRISTOWN, NJ., December 9, 2002 - "We're saving $3-to-$4 million annually as a result of the new system." That’s the estimate of Pat Mullen, vice president for distribution operations and customer service at Duluth-based Minnesota Power—an SPL WorldGroup customer for more than a decade.

Benefits
Using its SPL system, Minnesota Power has been able to:

• Provide single-billing capability for multiple utility services, loan repayments, and rents on land around reservoirs leased for vacation cottages.
• Consolidate the City of Duluth’s previous 450 utility bills into one monthly statement.
• Reduce customer service staff while simultaneously holding steady or improving customer service satisfaction. The reduction was possible because the new system permitted administrative work, previously divided among area offices, to be centralized in a Call Center. Area offices remained in place but were closed to walk-in service.
• Slash the need for programmers from an entire department to one. System users can implement rate changes over one or two days that previously required months.
• Level workload, thus improving efficiency. "The system is intuitive," says CIS Administrator Luann Lavalley, "so staff can readily switch among positions."
• Enable "what-if" scenario development that fully vets business propositions before implementation.
• Facilitate outsourcing of bill printing and mailing and the negotiation of better rates with outside credit and collections service providers.
• Reduce training costs. "There’s a good flow from screen to screen," says Lavalley, "which helps users learn."
• Permit data entry from many different sources, ensuring complete records and shortening conversations with new customers.
• Schedule services. Concurrent meter reads and disconnects, for instance, reduce field personnel costs.

Green Programs
As customers explore ways to reduce energy’s environmental impact, Minnesota Power’s new Rate Subsystem:

• Automatically nets out bills for a customer with a windmill and two meters—one measuring grid electricity consumed, the other measuring electricity sold back to the grid.
• Captures data that permits a single-meter approach to combined grid consumption and sellback for large co-generators.
• Accommodates weatherization credits and other conservation initiatives.
• Provides tables and graphics that help customers manage consumption.

Both Lavalley and Mullen praise SPL staff’s technical and industry. "They’re interested in our business," says Mullen. "Our system has already exceeded our cost and quality expectations, but SPL still wants to help us make our business better."

That’s a commitment that will continue, says SPL CEO CD Hobbs. "Our work with Minnesota Power has been invaluable to the evolution of our CorDaptix™ customer management product," he says. "We share Minnesota Power’s customer-centric vision, and we are gratified to play a role in the many ways they support and serve their community."

About Minnesota Power
Minnesota Power, an ALLETE company (NYSE: ALE) (www.allete.com), is an investorowned
utility that serves 145,000 customers in northeastern Minnesota and northwestern
Wisconsin with affordable electricity. The company supplies wholesale electric power to 16
municipal systems and markets power across the Midwest through its membership in Split
Rock Energy LLC.

About SPL WorldGroup
Established in 1994, SPL WorldGroup is a leading provider of best-of-breed customer management solutions. With a 100% record of successful implementations, SPL continues to demonstrate its place as the market leader, providing companies with flexible and scalable customer management solutions that offer a crucial advantage in an increasingly customercentric environment—the proven ability to attract, nurture and maximize the value of customers through billing excellence and innovation in customer management, sales and marketing. With particular strength in energy sector markets that require multi-language, multi-jurisdiction, multi-currency, and multi-product service lines, SPL has delivered its customer management solutions to financial services, energy, water and waste management customers worldwide. The company employs more than 650 professionals in North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific. Visit SPL WorldGroup at www.splwg.com.

About CorDaptix
SPL's CorDaptix™ is the innovative, adaptable and fully upgradeable customer management product designed to provide scalable solutions that withstand the test of time, growth, and product and service line introductions and extinctions. Its automated handling of direct-access service requests and its billing flexibility - including its ability to handle combinations of commodity and non-commodity products and services - make it particularly well suited for energy retailers. CorDaptix scales readily from a few thousand customers to many millions, and its intuitive interface and customer-centric data model give retailers' customer service representatives the immediate information access they need to serve and retain customers.

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