The Swedish fintech Billogram helps telecom operators cut billing-related customer support calls by automating the invoice-to-cash process, with results of up to 40 percent fewer support tickets at some clients. In this TP:Talks episode Ed Achterberg speaks with Jonas Suijkerbuijk, CEO and founder of Billogram, about recurring payments, open banking and why the invoice is one of the most underused touchpoints in the customer journey. Billogram, founded in 2011 in Sweden, has grown into a pan-European payment lifecycle platform active in the Nordics, the Netherlands and increasingly the wider Benelux region. Since 2023 the company holds its own payment service provider licence.
Telco calls to support are 50 to 80 percent billing-related
Billing is a major driver of customer support volume in telecom, according to Suijkerbuijk. "Here it's around between 50 and 80 percent," he says of the share of Nordic telco support calls related to invoicing and payments. Telenor and 3 are among Billogram's telco customers in the region. For Vimla, a Telenor-owned challenger brand, Billogram digitalised the entire invoicing flow, which brought support tickets down by roughly 40 percent. "That's the best number we have, to be honest," Suijkerbuijk says, though he notes the impact is significant across most clients. Similar results have been achieved in broadband, where one of Sweden's five largest providers saw comparable reductions after digitalising its payment flow.
Clear invoices and AI-driven dunning make the difference
Suijkerbuijk attributes the improvement mainly to customer-friendliness rather than new technology. He points to clear and transparent invoices, reliable distribution, and a dunning process that nudges customers to pay on time instead of pushing them into hard collections. Billogram does not send traditional invoices to consumers. Customers are notified and directed to a personalised payment page via a direct link, styled in the operator's own branding, where they can pay, get support or be offered additional services. Artificial intelligence is increasingly used to fine-tune that dunning process, timing reminders and payment retries and adjusting message tone. "I think timing is almost the most impactful thing," Suijkerbuijk says. The company has also built Agentic Assist, a tool that can answer payment questions and, if a client allows it, take actions such as extending due dates or waiving reminder fees.
Open banking and e-invoicing mandates reshape European payments
Suijkerbuijk describes the European payments landscape as changing faster than in years. Open banking, driven by the PSD2 directive and the incoming PSD3, is making account-to-account onboarding for direct debit cheaper and more customer-friendly. "I would almost say an Apple Pay-like onboarding into very cost-efficient payment rails," he says. SEPA Instant adds settlement within seconds instead of days, and national initiatives such as Wero in the Netherlands and Swish in Sweden are pushing toward European-based payment infrastructure. For business-to-business companies, new e-invoicing mandates are rolling out across the EU, together with VIDA-related tax reporting requirements already in force in Italy and expected to follow in Germany, France and Belgium. "Every time they release a new standard, it's just another standard," Suijkerbuijk says, though he expects specialised technology partners to absorb much of that complexity over time.
Growth focus shifts from Nordics to DACH and Benelux
Billogram is currently investing more in growth in the DACH (Germany, Austria and Switzerland) and Benelux regions than in its home Nordic market, as it moves toward becoming a pan-European platform. Suijkerbuijk's advice to telecom operators and other high-volume consumer businesses is to treat payments as a strategic topic rather than a cost center, given the pace of regulatory and technological change in the sector.
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