Automated customer service agents, also known as service bots, are significantly changing the way customers are offered services. Instead of inviting the customers to their outlets, organizations are sending the automated agents to the customers directly for providing various services. With the help of automated agents, customers can get product information, place orders, book air tickets, and so on. These agents, powered by Artificial Intelligence (AI) techniques, provide efficient services to the customers. With advances in Natural Language Understanding and Voice Recognition, these agents allow customers to have real time conversation in their own languages. This article presents an overview of automated customer service agents, including their characteristics along with examples and the scope of automated agents in India.

Initially, passive and low cost channels such as FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions) and search engines were used to resolve repetitive and generic customer service inquiries.

E-Mail is a tool for strengthening customer service and increasing user's confidence. Confirmation messages and other automated transactional e-mail can reach out to customers. Automation of e-mail is possible. For example, Follow-up Mailer is an automated system that instantly e-mails information to the potential customers. Moreover, it can automatically follow up with them at preset time intervals. It checks the contents of the incoming e-mails and sends reply automatically. But the disadvantage is that the users are finding the e-mail service as a stressful burden on them. If there is any unnecessary or unimportant information found in the message, it will be a waste of time for the users to go through. Messages are often not distinguishable from spam and are therefore deleted even before the customers read them.

FAQs contain only a small list of questions. These questions are prepared with the hope that these will provide the customers almost all the necessary information. However, this is not always true. The FAQs are not flexible in the sense that the customers can only access the available information, but if they want some additional information or the information is not available on the list but any way important to them, there is no support from this tool.

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