the green room | customer story

BankSouth

BankSouth is a community bank serving the entire state of Georgia, with five branches and a robust digital presence. The bank has over $1 billion in assets, more than 20,000 customers and 138 employees. Its mission is to do whatever it takes to serve its customers with their financial needs.

"Wherever customers abandon in the workflow, we want to integrate Rita to offer guidance. We anticipate Rita popping up in various workflows throughout the experience." 

 
— Harry Gunsallus, Chief Innovation Officer, BankSouth
What they needed

Customer service and support that went beyond the call center

Being a highly customer-focused organization, BankSouth saw a growing need to support users after hours and on weekends. But its small customer care center was comprised of just six employees, which meant the bank could only offer support from a live person during regular business hours. In its efforts to find a solution that didn’t require increasing headcount or outsourcing support, BankSouth began evaluating chatbots—or intelligent virtual assistants—which fit well with its high-touch, high-tech strategy.

What we delivered

A solution for servicing customers around the clock

BankSouth chose NCR Conversational AI powered by Kasisto to fill this need for a virtual assistant. It was an obvious choice, as it was already seamlessly integrated into BankSouth’s digital banking solution and had been purpose-built specifically for financial institutions. BankSouth developed over 500 intents, including questions that the virtual assistant could ask, along with appropriate responses. These responses also routed customers to online workflows featuring virtual guidance throughout the entire process. The solution's comprehensive business dashboard allowed BankSouth to monitor and modify content in real time. The bank named its new virtual assistant “Rita.”

What happened next

A super-successful virtual assistant named Rita

Today, Rita helps educate and inform customers, guides them through workflows like new account applications, and routes them directly into other systems (such as bill pay) to complete transactions. Customers love that they can get responses on nights and weekends and want to be able to do even more. Over 2,300 interactions have been initiated with Rita, 85% of which have been completed without any human intervention. Most interactions are occurring during the day, indicating that BankSouth's customers are going to Rita first and helping take pressure off the call center.