"Aloha," "Mahalo," these are some of the expressions Hawaiians use in their daily communications, so when it comes time for them to interact with their local bank, the same communications are expected.  

 

In a bid to maximize their customer's self-service experience, American Savings Bank sought a solution that could be customized to reflect Hawaiian culture and show their customers they cared.

 

For this, they chose to speech-enable their automated systems using the Omvia Voice Framework from Intervoice (News - Alert) and running in a Cisco IP environment.

 

A key importance in their deployment was the user's satisfaction with the system and likelihood of using it. They also needed a way to improve their cost efficiencies.

 

With Intervoice, who they had already worked with for touchtone IVR, they were able to customize speech self-service applications for an easy to use, more personable system.

 

First launched in 2004, the system was successful and according to a published customer success story, "speech-enabled self-service has enabled American Savings Bank to reduce the cost of service delivery while improving overall customer satisfaction." By the time four months had passed, they had already handled over 340,000 calls a month.

 

Realizing the success of the system, the bank encouraged more people to use the self-service option, many of which were already doing so since they could relate to the Hawaiian voice they were interacting with. For the deployment, they used a female voice that had a Hawaiian accent and a regional dialect.

 

With the system in place, the bank is able to offer 24/7 service for customers while also improving their operations by automating information on basic questions.

 

Another significant factor in the deployment of the system was that American Saving Bank's need for a system that was well tested before implementing. With Intervoice they were able to complete successful market studies and testing of usability, to maximize the success rate of their deployment.

 

"Customers like the new applications-it's something fun and new. Usability testing was paramount in ensuring that customers would use the automated system and it has been very successful thus far. Its available 24/7 and is a cost effective and efficient way to provide them with that information," the customer success story quoted Renee Lum AVP/Manager, American Saving Bank's Customer Service Center as saying.