Agent assist is software that shows a contact centre agent the right answer on screen during a live call or chat, based on what the customer is saying at that moment. It is also called real-time agent guidance. It is one part of conversation intelligence.
Agents must answer questions about hundreds of products, plans and rules. A new agent cannot remember them all. Searching a help article while the customer waits takes time, and the customer may get a wrong answer. Agent assist does the searching for the agent, while the conversation is still going on.
It works in three steps, repeated throughout the call. First, it converts the customer's words into text as they are spoken, through speech recognition. On a chat, it reads the text directly. Second, it works out what the customer is asking about. Third, it looks up the answer in the company's help articles and in the customer's own record, and shows a short suggestion on the agent's screen. Some products also show a checklist, such as "read out the cancellation charges", and tick each item when the agent says it.
Imagine a chat agent at an online travel company. A customer writes: "My visa has been rejected. Can I cancel my Goa hotel booking?" Agent assist recognises a cancellation request. It opens the booking on screen: a hotel in Goa for ₹12,400, with check-in in five days. It finds the hotel's rule: free cancellation up to 48 hours before check-in. So it shows the agent a suggested reply: "You can cancel with a full refund of ₹12,400, because check-in is more than 48 hours away. The refund reaches your account in 5 to 7 working days." The agent checks the suggestion, adds a line of sympathy, and sends it. A new agent gives the correct answer in under a minute.
The agent stays in charge. The software suggests, and the person decides what to say. This is the main difference from an AI customer service agent, which replies to the customer itself. Agent assist is often a first step for a company. It helps the agents with AI before the company lets AI answer customers directly.
After the call, many products also write the call notes for the agent, as call transcription and AI summaries do on a business phone system. And the suggestions are only as good as the help articles behind them. So companies keep those articles up to date with knowledge management for customer service.