Working in a call centre can be challenging. Customers are often distressed, and workloads can be significant, leading to mounting pressure to resolve issues quickly and effectively.
This is where AI has the potential to revolutionise the way agents work, enabling them to address problems more efficiently and provide customers with highly personalised solutions. This is a potential to create better productivity, but AI is unlikley to fully replace the human operator, according to a leading expert.
But how will AI transform the call centre, and could it eventually replace agents entirely?
Digital Journal has Ben Booth, CEO and Co-Founder of MaxContact, a contact centre software specialist, who has weighed in on AI completely replacing traditional call centres and what call centres can do to optimise developing technology.
Booth explains the possible advanatges: “As AI technology has developed in the past few years, more businesses than ever are now using it to enhance customer experience, call centres included. While replacing traditional call centres completely in favour of chatbots by some companies is certainly an interesting move, it’s not the only industry to be doing so.”
Job losses?
Booth considers job cuts to be unlikely in the longer-term, noting: “Indeed, there has been a lot of talk over the past year about job losses in call centres due to AI. But even though it may speed up response times, many people call customer service lines in the first place because they want to talk to a real person who will not only help them with any problems they may be having, but also someone who will understand and care about their query.”
Customer-centric
Booth foresees AI as boosting the customer-centric remit of most call centres: “According to our survey on agent and team performance, the top priorities for contact centre leaders are delivering excellent service (47.0%) and ensuring team happiness (46.6%). Therefore, in order to achieve these goals, call centres need to focus on building a customer-centric culture that empowers agents to deliver great experiences. Investing in training that enhances product knowledge, communication, and problem-solving while equipping agents with the tools and authority to resolve customer issues efficiently is key.”
Limited now, potential future
AI is, however, not suffiicently advanced to deliver efficiency to the maximum level: “Unfortunately, at the moment AI technologies are not advanced enough to empathise in the same way humans can. Not only that, but some problems that people need help with don’t have clear-cut answers, and at the moment AI technologies on their own cannot improvise or offer personalised solutions in the same way that humans can.”
Booth reveals an example to illustrate his point: “I’ve recently read about a company that has chosen to completely turn off their phone lines in favour of using AI and chatbots, and reviews suggest they have had less success in terms of customer satisfaction and resolving issues.”
So, what does this mean in terms of practical value? Booth advises: “Therefore, instead of opting to completely replace traditional call centres in favour of AI, call centres should be using new technology to leverage and add to their business to enhance customer service, rather than replacing humans completely.”
Automation
Booth concludes with what AI can achieve today: “Incorporating AI into call centres offers significant benefits without the need to replace agents entirely. With an average of 35% of calls manually evaluated each week by contact centres, AI speech analytics can help manage this by automatically identifying sentiment analysis from any calls, allowing agents to focus on more complex, value-added interactions. Tools like chatbots and knowledge bases reduce the volume of simple enquiries, while AI-powered workforce management systems optimise staffing levels and predict demand more accurately.”
In short, this means that humans could have more time: “By freeing agents from repetitive manual tasks, AI enhances efficiency and supports a healthier work-life balance without compromising job satisfaction or performance. It’s about creating a balanced approach where AI complements human skills, driving both operational improvements and agent well-being.”
“It can also help to improve and empower agents’ responses and recommendations to customers. While AI cannot fully replace human empathy, it can make suggestions that help agents deal with difficult situations and, in the long run, improve sales and business.”
Future perfect?
Booth ends by speculating what AI might deliver: “Overall, it is not yet clear whether AI will reach a point where it can ever fully replace agents in call centres. Instead, businesses should consider how they can use cutting-edge technology to improve their operations and increase sales and profits.”
