DBS is set to deploy an Gen AI-powered virtual assistant, named “CSO Assistant,” to its 500 Customer Service Officers (CSOs) in Singapore by the end of 2024.

The Gen AI-powered CSO Assistant aims to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of handling over 250,000 consumer and corporate customer queries each month.

Developed in-house by DBS‘s AI engineers, the CSO Assistant integrates a Large Language Model tailored to local languages with voice telephony and speech recognition capabilities.

DBS’ Gen AI assistant transcribes customer queries in real-time and conducts live searches on the bank’s knowledge base to quickly retrieve query-specific information, allowing CSOs to provide quick and relevant solutions.

The assistant also aids in post-call documentation by offering instant call summaries and pre-filling service request fields.

Since the pilot began in October 2023, the CSO Assistant has reportedly shown nearly 100% accuracy in transcription and solutioning.

DBS expects its Gen AI assistant to reduce call handling time by up to 20% once fully implemented.

Feedback from the pilot indicates that nearly 90% of participating CSOs found the assistant positively impacted their workflow and are confident in its long-term use.

DBS plans to progressively roll out the CSO Assistant to Taiwan and Hong Kong over the next 12 months.

Nimish Panchmatia, Chief Data and Transformation Officer, DBS, said,

“We see Gen AI as a co-pilot to supercharge our employees, and our immediate focus has been on driving efficiency gains and quality improvement. CSO Assistant is a prime example of how we leverage Gen AI innovatively to remove toil in the way we work, which in turn enables our people to enhance customer journeys and deliver differentiated customer outcomes.

In developing CSO Assistant, we took a measured approach by stress-testing it against our responsible data use frameworks, and iteratively enhancing it based on feedback received during the pilot.”

Featured image credit: edited from DBS