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BCA provides chat-based assistant as alternative to call center
Private lender Bank Central Asia senior vice president I Ketut Alam Wangsawijaya has said that VIRA, the company’s chat-based virtual assistant introduced in February, has started to attract more customers because of its faster response time compared to the bank’s conventional call center
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People withdraw cash at BCA's ATMs. (Kompas/Heru Sri Kumoro)
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rivate lender Bank Central Asia senior vice president I Ketut Alam Wangsawijaya has said that VIRA, the company’s chat-based virtual assistant introduced in February, has started to attract more customers because of its faster response time compared to the bank’s conventional call center.
Since its launch, the virtual assistant, which uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology, has gained more than 180,000 users from various messenger apps, including Facebook Messenger, Line, and Kaskus Chat.
“BCA customers can just add BCA's official account on Facebook Messenger, LINE and Kaskus Chat,” Ketut said in Jakarta on Sunday, adding that the new service was expected to ease the burden of its HaloBCA phone-based customer service, which received 14.5 million calls last year.
Through the virtual assistant, customers can also access a range of information, including exchange rates, transaction information and appointments for credit card and mortgage applications.
“Last year, our mobile banking users reached 800 million and grows more than 30 percent every year. If we had not anticipated [such growth] by applying AI technology, our HaloBCA and ATM expansion would not be enough [to cater to customers],” Ketut said.
However, BCA’s AI technology will not fully replace its call center, because the latter will continuously be used by certain customer segments.
“We try to provide as many choices as possible to our customers, who come from different segments, such as businessmen, millennials and others. There are people who still prefer to call instead of message,” Ketut added. (dis/bbn)
