By Tom Cassidy, Wealth Consultant at Simplify Consulting
Customer contact centres in the wealth industry face numerous obstacles including low customer satisfaction, high staff turnover and capacity planning difficulties.
It won’t surprise anyone to hear customers feel frustrated with call wait times and, when they get advice, are often unhappy about the quality of information they receive – which is often due to inadequate staff training. Even worse, they are often bounced from department to department.
High attrition rates are an ongoing problem. Staff turnover since Covid has increased to 42%, some figures place it as high as 58% 1. Against this backdrop, managers must reconcile inbound calls and staff rotas to ensure key call centre metrics, such as customer satisfaction targets, Average Handling Times (AHT) and abandonment rates are met.
In a bid to tackle the problems, wealth firms are asking how they can enhance AI to support work in contact centres and how can AI be harnessed for future digital transformation in the sector.
Application of AI in Contact Centres
There is significant potential for AI to assist in executing changes smoothly without causing substantial interruptions to customer service. Voice communication is vital for contact centre effectiveness; AI provides an opportunity to enhance, not replace this.
Here are some applications and solutions that AI can provide to address these challenges:
· AI-Powered Recommendations is an innovative new tool designed to assist call handlers by revolutionising the way calls are handled by providing support and guidance at every step. It will analyse the call in real time, highlighting any relevant data and providing contextual AI nudges based on its understanding of the call. The prediction is that this tool can lower AHT’s by almost 40% and reduce call handler errors by as much as 70%. Companies implementing this should experience a reduction in repeat calls and overall improvements in the customer’s experience.
· Predictive Call Routing (PCR) has become more sophisticated. Instead of just routing the inbound call to a specific team or department, it can single out handlers who are best able to take and resolve the call. This supports the customer based on skill set or personality, rather than just the ‘next available representative’. The end result is a more personalised service for each customer, leading to an improved experience, making customers feel valued. Done right will serve to increase brand loyalty.
· Call Transcriptions are an effective way to collect data that both adds to the customer’s information and gives a more personalised experience. In addition, they can be used as a training resource for new staff and can help bring down staff attrition.
· Customer Verification has been effectively trialled by numerous UK banks and wealth management providers over recent years, enabling full AI customer verification by speech, rather than the usual, time consuming line of questions.
· Emotional Intelligence AI can now assist call handlers by assessing sentiment and empathy in a call, and as a result it can deliver real-time results. By understanding customers’ emotions/vulnerabilities, it can help the handler by suggesting appropriate responses. This has the potential to increase productivity, highlight customer complaints prior to being raised and improve overall customer satisfaction.
The adoption of AI tools do create risks and challenges. One is the ethical considerations of customer privacy and data protection, but perhaps the biggest challenge is that AI lacks the human touch. However, without it, customers can become easily frustrated.
What Are the AI Possibilities?
Looking forward, a re-balance is perhaps needed so that humans spend less time on standard tasks, such as changing a client address or bank details, and more time on those roles where a human voice and interaction is essential. Equally, customers could be given a choice of AI or human, with respective wait times made clear.
So, in years to come what might be possible for AI, and how could it be applied to contact centres?
Here are a few options:
· Staff Management: AI can help in planning and rotating staff with relevant skill sets to ensure necessary coverage for calls. It can identify external factors that might affect call volumes, such as news coverage, and alert team managers while also suggesting a resource plan.
· Summarising and Analysing Calls: AI can retrospectively review and summarise calls en masse. For example, if a product change has occurred and a large number of letters have been issued, AI could identify calls related to that mailing based on the conversation transcripts. It could also understand why the mailing generated a call and help improve mass communication.
Currently, 31% of customers perceive AI to have a negative impact on service quality, according to data from the UK Call Centre Management Association.
To address this and to realise AI’s benefits, there must be recognition that its fundamental purpose is to enhance human interactions, not replace them. As work practices evolve to allow for a more personalised customer experience, AI might provide convenience by effectively offering customers a one-stop-shop to complete requests.
These benefits are designed to counteract the challenges currently faced by contact centres within the industry and are certainly within our grasp in the near future.
