How Utility Companies Use Conversational AI

While chatbot first response times are fast, it’s not really a great indicator of performance, since there aren’t any queues with a machine. We decided to gather more data by testing customer service response and resolution times for Energy companies in Sweden for our State of Customer Experience in the Energy Sector Report. Even for teams without a history of unexpected surges in customer service, we see incredible efficiencies.

Two decades ago, online payment through a company website revolutionized the relationship between utilities and their customers. The next step in expanding that relationship is offering accessibility across a plurality of devices and starting points. Ice storms, frozen pipes, hurricanes, and other calamities create massive, but semi-predictable, increases in service calls.

Give Customers 24/7 Service

In the case of complex queries, a human agent can instantly jump in and take over from the bot, and address the concerns of the customers using bot-to-human handover. Agents can also monitor the bot conversation history allowing them to jump in with the context. This ensures smooth customer-experience resulting in happy, satisfied customers. With the help of WhatsApp chatbot for utilities, you can automate live support and allow your customers to reach out to you through a medium they are well-acquainted with. A utility chatbot on WhatsApp can be used to respond to customers instantly.

JennyBot answers FAQs at lightspeed so your customer service advisors can focus on complex questions without burning out on simpler and frequent queries. Another good example of chatbots in the utilities industry is Butagaz’s virtual assistant. Appointment-taking can be automated by connecting the chatbot with the scheduling system to automatically offer a suitable appointment to the customer without the intervention of any agents. Provide intelligent, automated, always-on self-service to immediately resolve routine inquiries on topics such as duplicate billing, tariff plans, usage, and terms and conditions. Transition seamlessly to assisted service—the full conversation context transfers as well—for more complex requests and inquiries. If you’d like a demo of our enterprise conversational AI platform or if you would like to discuss the use cases for chatbots for your business goals please contact us and we’ll be in touch.

What is the need for WhatsApp Chatbot for the Utilities Sector?

Additionally, customers may complain about inaccurate bills due to human error in meter readings. To thrive in this competitive landscape, companies must prioritise customer satisfaction by investing in customer service bots. While companies in the utility sector often employ AI technology for operational tasks and data collection, they tend to overlook the significance of effective customer communication. Simply delivering electricity is no longer enough; customers seek cost reduction, energy conservation, sustainability, and access to new products. With digital capabilities, personalised services and a wider product range are in demand. Conversational AI chatbots become your automated sales and service solution.

Today’s utility customers expect deeper engagement and long-term relationships with suppliers. The increase in smart home management reflects their desire for better chatbots for utilities energy management and understanding of utility consumption. See how Ambit automates customer service at scalewhile reducing costs and generating revenue.

Let’s take an example with Inbenta’s technology and see what their bots are already capable of doing for a utility company. Advanced chatbots integrate through APIs and webhooks to other systems, such as CRMs, CMSs, ERPs, but also internal systems of banks, insurance companies, telephone companies and even eCommerce stock systems. In the 11 months since the utility deployed a [24]7.ai chatbot to interact with its four million customers, the chatbot answered more than 720,000 questions with 94% accuracy. The use case for RPA is about more structured, predictable, and high-volume processes while smart bots can be applied to more fluid, versatile, and user-facing use cases. More and more the lines between the two are blurring as the use cases for smart bots move beyond the virtual assistant in the contact center. The old rules of the application development lifecycle, which required lengthy software packaging, manual testing, environment creation, and software deployment are falling away, Menendez says.

Customers don’t want to call support hotlines; they do it because they need to. They need to start or cancel services, report an outage, pay their bills, and so on. Making those processes easy is the difference between satisfied, happy customers creating a positive buzz in the community or on social media and frustrated clients looking to change service providers. Nonetheless, if your objective is to achieve advanced real-time analytics and efficient decision-making based on customer data, investing in AI chatbots would be more advantageous. However, the most advanced capabilities of current chatbots can go above and beyond.

Inbenta Appoints Merlin Bise as Chief Technology Officer

GetJenny chatbots help you reach more visitors on your website and close new contracts thanks to RPA integrations with your customer relationship management software. Energize your business and customer relationships with the power of artificial intelligence, machine learning, and AI-powered agents. [24]7.ai solutions let you support your customers whenever they want it and on their device of choice. Use data to predict consumer intent and then respond in real time, creating happy customers and advocates for your business.

It further allows utility services to cross-sell other plans to existing customers based on their interactions. UK-based startup We Build Bots develops Intelagent, an energy and water utility chatbot for customer assistance. Intelagent is deployable on multiple platforms including websites and social media channels where utility customers usually ask questions. The solution ensures that energy utility companies do not lose customers even if they shift homes by facilitating efficient communications and support for the transition from one location to the next.

Alba Power focuses on Conversational AI

And they can offer it 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and 365 days a year in multiple languages. Customers can ask for exactly what they want and get an immediate response because IVAs can understand caller intent. Understanding a caller’s intent quicker will decrease overall phone time, which is appreciated on both ends of the line. And when IVAs manage common inquiries, live agents have more availability to address customers with more complex issues. This efficiency creates a competitive advantage for any company that’s implemented conversational AI.

• Having that cloud-based, microservices architecture lets Exelon deliver new features to customers faster, and react to new customer expectations such as chatbots.
• This might mean answering customers’ commonly asked questions, or if an inquiry is too complex, forwarding them to a live agent that can.
• With SEW’s smart customer service chatbot, virtual agents and live chat services, energy and water providers can establish deeper and stronger customer relationships and drive digital self-service.
• While AI chatbots are generally more sophisticated, they may not always be necessary in this sector.
• While they provide in-depth analysis to the company, they provide information to customers on their needs and let them change certain data, such as their tariffs, locations, etc.

While all of these technologies play a major role in advancing utility management, they only represent the tip of the iceberg. To explore more solutions, simply get in touch to let us look into your areas of interest. For a more general overview, you can download one of our free Industry Innovation Reports to save your time and improve strategic decision-making. By upgrading to an automated virtual assistant i.e. a utilities WhatsApp chatbot, providers can reduce time and resources on manual execution of operational activities, saving money and time in the utilities sector. Integrate a chatbot for utilities on the channels your customers prefer to provide an omnichannel experience in conversational channels. AI chatbots can provide the analytical capabilities required to extract valuable insights and make data-driven decisions in the utility sector.

Empowers agents to quickly resolve customer issues across voice, video, chat, and messaging channels. [24]7 Agent Services is the leading provider of BPO solutions to global Fortune 500 clients, offering highly-skilled chat, messaging, voice, and email agents. Better identify customers likely to surface complaints or issues and then intervene for a timely resolution, steering customers to the best escalation channel for their intent.

Chatbots interpret user questions using natural language processing (NLP) and provide an instant pre-set answer. To support utilities with customer queries, many startups develop website-based chatbot solutions trained specifically for utility queries. Hiring customer service employees puts a financial burden on utility companies. Also, it is inefficient for employees to manually handle customer queries because of their repetitive nature. In contrast, AI-based chatbots build customer loyalty through instant, positive, and frictionless service experiences, as well as reduce customer care costs through automation and self-service options. Hence, startups develop chatbots that instantly reply to billing, complaints, or other service requests.

5) Chatbots Help Automate Field Service RequestsTraditionally chatbots are used for customer self-service, but in field service, they can support technicians in the field. SightCall Video Assistance Chatbot for Salesforce is an example of a chatbot that can be used as a resource to help technicians when they are having issues resolving a service order. Most field service organizations operate in saturated markets where the key to success hinges on competitive differentiation and great customer service. Chatbots can help support a robust customer service initiative by automating simple processes without losing the level of human interaction that customers require for a positive experience. Elevate customer experience with human-like voice AI agents, proficient in understanding intent, industry-specific phrases and providing personalized responses.

Here are 8 tips that help you to deliver amazing live chat service to your website visitors and turn them… Successful chatbot integration is a major step for energy companies to create more meaningful relationships with their customers. It’s important to examine how automation rates for your industry grow over time.

Further, it reduces peak load for service providers, increases program enrollments, automates frequently asked questions (FAQs), and keeps customers engaged by simplifying home energy management. By combining these technologies, hybrid chatbots offer an improved user experience. They leverage AI to handle complex requests while maintaining accuracy and consistency through rule-based systems. The popularity of hybrid chatbots is on the rise, particularly in customer support engagements, and this upward trend is expected to continue. That’s why Neoenergia, part of Iberdrola, a major utility company operating around the world, decided to implement natural language understanding chatbots through WhatsApp to assist their customers.

The use cases for digital assistants have a far wider reach and implications for energy and utility companies than just the simple Q&A type chatbots. And third, natural language processing, artificial intelligence, and machine learning capabilities are advancing quickly, making smart chatbots relevant and practical. With AI powered chatbots, organizations can finally deliver convenience and personalization that customers prefer. Customers will increasingly notice the difference between companies that have true AI-powered learning apps and those that don’t.