With Contact Centers Facing a Surge in Callers, Nuance Introduces AI that Eliminates Putting Customers On Hold

BURLINGTON, Mass., April 14, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Nuance^®Communications, Inc. (NASDAQ: NUAN) today announced a solution that uses AI to eliminate putting customers on hold. Instead of having customers wait on hold, or offer to wait for a call back, enterprises adding Nuance Voice-to-Agent Messaging to their contact center phone/IVR system can let their customers leave a voice message of any length to explain their issue and requests. Voice-to-Agent uses conversational AI to automatically convert the customer voice message into text, then uses natural language understanding to understand the customer request and route to the best agent or agent pool. Nuance’s AI can also provide agents with proposed answers and automatically send an SMS to the customer with a personalized response.

As reported in recent weeks, COVID-19 has pushed organizations around the globe to establish remote contact centers and enable their agents to continue servicing customers while maintaining safety and security. In parallel, especially in certain industries like financial services, healthcare, airlines, retail and telecommunications, the demand for customer service is skyrocketing. The result is often long wait times for customers and agents tasked with effectively answering mounting customer calls. At the same time, organizations are accelerating their Digital Transformation strategies and increasing digital interactions with customers.

The new Voice-to-Agent Messaging addition to Nuance’s IVR-to-Digital solution suite is first of a kind and allows customers to quickly voice their needs or concerns so organizations can move interactions to digital channels where automation and asynchronous conversations are often more impactful. The new enhancement can transcribe voice-to-text in real time, getting virtual assistants and/or live agents all the relevant information about a given customer before they contact that individual. Therefore, when an agent engages the customer, they are able to have shorter more concise conversations. As a result, live agents and virtual assistants can effectively serve more customers on the channel that best fits their requests.

“In any situation where an organization is facing a surge in callers, the ability to quickly understand the call context removes the heavy burden on call center agents and makes for a better customer experience. Instead of waiting on hold, they can simply leave a voice message and get their question answered via an SMS chat,” said Tony Lorentzen, General Manager and Head of the Intelligent Engagement business at Nuance. “Because our platform is unified, not only is it easy for customers to solve for high-demand times, but it also brings channels together in a controlled way that can simultaneously accelerate digital-first strategies and future plans.”

For more information on Nuance’s Intelligent Engagement platform click here, and to learn more about how Nuance is helping customers during the current COVID-19 situation click here.

About Nuance Communications, Inc.
Nuance Communications (NASDAQ: NUAN) is the pioneer and leader in conversational AI innovations that bring intelligence to everyday work and life. The company delivers solutions that understand, analyze, and respond to people – amplifying human intelligence to increase productivity and security. With decades of domain and AI expertise, Nuance works with thousands of organizations globally across healthcare, financial services, telecommunications, government, and retail – to create stronger relationships and better experiences for their customers and workforce. For more information, please visit www.nuance.com.