Contact Centre of the Future – Pensions & Retail Investments

The vast majority of Pension & Retail Investment firms still provide customer service via the traditional channels of telephone and post. Whether this is driven by preference, or wider concerns such as security or data protection, it means that contact channels for many firms have remained largely unchanged for years. New technologies such as secure mailboxes are starting to permeate and change the landscape; however existing customer service channels also need modernizing.

The emergence of Artificial Intelligence (AI) presents efficiency and automation opportunities for firms utilizing contact centers as part of their operations. The capabilities offered by AI are becoming more common across the market as initial concerns around security and AI sharing untrue information are starting to alleviate. However, the majority of firms are very much at the start of their AI journey, with initial applications being 1-2 simple use cases to demonstrate potential benefits.

The Contact Centre offers a huge opportunity for firms to transform their traditional operation through adopting AI technologies, using either an incremental or ‘big bang’ approach.

Opening hours for Traditional Contact Centers are regularly 9am-5pm on weekdays, with limited out-of-hours or weekend support (as opposed to 24/7 support that AI can offer). Customers are required to dial in, where they are either passed through to a customer service agent (often with long waiting times) or presented with an Interactive Voice Response (IVR).

An IVR gives the customer a select number of options to choose from, following which a customer may sit in a queue waiting for an agent to become available.

Once an agent picks up the phone, a series of manual security checks are often required to start the basis of the customer call – security checks often amount to a significant portion of the call.

Customer service agents are required to manually take notes throughout the call, and whilst in some instances agents can perform direct tasks (e.g. change of customer details), there are others where actions are passed to Back Office teams to manually update internal systems (i.e. CRM, Policy Admin System).

There are multiple ways AI can benefit the Contact Centre of the Future, and it is important to consider the following opportunities as modular. Organizations can utilize the following modules individually (as opposed to implementing all at once), with staggered deployments to enable learnings:

AI Assistants

• Customers interact with an AI Assistant (such as a Chatbot) via multiple channels (incl. online, mobile, WhatsApp) for answers to FAQs and to perform processes (e.g. information capture, verification, updating account details)
• AI Assistants can be available to respond to customer queries 24/7, and call backs can be requested should a customer want to speak to an agent
• Even when using AI Assistants via webchat, there is an option for live chat hand-off should a customer wish to speak to an agent as opposed to AI

Interactive Voice Assistant (IVA)

• An Interactive Voice Assistant (IVA) replaces traditional call menus (such as an IVR) by acting a digital call reception utilizing AI to classify and triage customer queries
• IVAs use AI to determine the best course of action, whether that be redirecting to another channel (e.g. webchat), or routing to a specific team
• Additionally, IVAs are used to automate customer security checks through capturing information provided and verifying customer identity

Agent Assist

• An Agent Assist tool sits alongside a customer service agent whilst they conduct customer calls, utilizing AI to monitor conversations in real-time and provide dynamic next best actions
• Agent Assist tools are used to analyze customer sentiment, with guidance adapted based on the specific firm’s knowledge base

Transcription & Summarization

• Perhaps a more readily used application of AI within the market is the transcription and summarization of customer calls
• This technology is used to detect key words to identify opportunities and maintain compliance, and also upload meeting notes into internal systems (i.e. CRM, Policy Admin System)

• Application of AI in the Contact Centre of the Future can be modular, which enables the delivery of business cases to support future deployments
• A full transformation is not required, with modules delivered in 6–8-week projects and benefits evidenced more rapidly than traditional transformation programmes
• Alongside clear efficiency benefits for the contact centre, AI also enables an enhanced customer experience through higher quality support, reduced waiting times, and increased availability

If you would like to find out more about how Alpha can help you with identifying use cases for AI and implementation of AI technologies, please contact us.