Customer service jobs have long been considered among the most vulnerable to the roll out and adoption of increasingly powerful artificial intelligence tools — a technology hailed by a senior executive at one of the world’s largest insurers as a “superpower”.
Germany’s Allianz has embraced the use of AI-powered applications, including the launch of a voice assistant in September, which provides roadside support in the event of breakdowns. It works in more than 20 languages, and is trained to prioritise the most urgent calls — such as those from a lone parent with young children in a car that has broken down in the middle of the night — and immediately transfer them to human agents.
In July, the insurer’s Australian business launched an app to speed up the processing of claims by homeowners for food spoilt in their refrigerators following power cuts caused by severe weather. “Generative and agentic AI is like a superpower which we use in order to improve the lives of our customers,” says Josef Teglas, Allianz’s group head of data and AI. “We are able to reduce the turnaround time and be there whenever needed, and resolve problems and claims much faster.”
But he also emphasises the importance of rolling out AI in a “responsible and safe manner”. Analysts say this caution reflects widespread feedback that AI still struggles to deal with more complex, real-world scenarios for customers, making it unlikely that call centres will fall quiet any time soon.
