Safaricom to deploy intelligent solutions to bolster its customer care services

Safaricom has said it will introduce intelligent solutions to its Customer Care organization in a move to strengthen service delivery to its customers.

“We are in the process of deploying intelligent solutions that will enable us to better understand our customer needs across all divisions of the company. The planned customer care centre will ease pressure on our existing centre – already the biggest in the region – even as it provides more employment opportunities,” said Safaricom CEO, Bob Collymore, at the company’s Annual General Meeting today.

Mr. Collymore added that the firm is also hiring 300 new staff to add to its 600 primary call centre staff to boost ongoing customer care initiatives.

Though the firm didn’t divulge details of the intelligence systems, Artificial Intelligence (AI) can have a great impact to any firms customer experience through creation of interactive systems which act as Intelligent Assistants answering calls and assisting customers whenever they call.

If Safaricom deploys enterprise Intelligent assistants powered by AI technologies, users would be able to call in and access numerous different services other than its done with limited interactive voice response systems (IVRs) today. AI is way better than IVRs because AI systems are smart and can detect a caller’s location and details and any issues he or she called in for help using Conversational AI unlike IVR which only relies on logical steps for troubleshooting.

In the last year, Safaricom commissioned 135 customer care desks across the country which aim to provide customers with easier access to essential services.

“We are progressively examining how we can improve the customer’s experience on our network. The additional staff should help decrease call waiting times at the Call Centre, while the mobile Care desks will ensure that more customers have enhanced access to the right services,” said Bob Collymore, CEO, Safaricom.

The initiatives form part of a two-year internal customer experience strategy that aims to lead to several transformational initiatives for the company’s customer engagement initiatives.

Specifically, the agenda aims to put the customer at the heart of all initiatives launched by the company, ensuring that all company efforts create individualized experiences for customers.