Bank Customer Service Going Live On Line

Banks are finding a worthy alternative to live representatives and canned telephone answers: live chat online.

Banks are finding a worthy alternative to live representatives and canned telephone answers: live chat online. Although live-chat technology has been around for many years, many institutions have found the cost prohibitive, or, if the expense wasn’t an issue, its clunkiness was. “Live-chat technology in the past did not provide the right kind of customer experience or securities that met” Citigroup’s standards, a spokesman for the firm told the Washington Times. “However, new, improved technology has emerged that provided the necessary quality to deploy this feature.” The effort and expense appear to be paying off handsomely for Citi. It found that, thanks to live chat, 80% of loan applicants complete the forms, as opposed to 50% who file online without live-chat assistance. And at Bank of America, online mortgage sales rose a whopping 800% in the first quarter of 2006, thanks to live-chat assistance.