Marks & Spencer is replacing call centre staff with artificial intelligence designed to quickly deal with customer complaints. The company is using software from technology companies Twilio and Google to automate the routing of calls. Previously, people calling M&S would have to speak to a human operator to be transferred to the right department. The new technology will be used in all 640 M&S UK stores by the end of September, as well as its 13 UK call centers. No jobs have been lost in the change, and the business will reassign over 100 employees to in-store roles, M&S said. M&S claims the technology correctly identifies 90pc of queries and can direct a call within seconds. It’s not yet clear how the new system will cope with accents. Previously, voice recognition systems such as Siri and Amazon Echo have struggled with strong Scottish and Yorkshire accents, among others. If the software doesn’t understand a customer then it will ask questions and prompt the customer to rephrase their query.
Marks & Spencer (M&S) is looking to manage customer complaints at call centres using artificial intelligence (AI). The company has been testing the use of AI in its call centre operations for several months and says it will be rolling out a pilot project later this year. M&S said that no jobs will be lost following the implementation of the new technology, which will be used in all M&S stores across the UK.