Oracle has introduced innovative AI-driven features in its Oracle Utilities Customer Platform, revolutionizing utility call centers by providing smarter, more efficient ways to manage call volumes and deliver personalized customer support. These new capabilities include advanced call summarization and tagging tools that aim to significantly reduce manual tasks. By automating time-consuming processes, Oracle is empowering call center agents to focus on what truly matters: offering quick resolutions, personalized interactions, and building genuine connections with customers at scale. The best part? These AI-powered enhancements will be available at no additional cost for utilities using Oracle Utilities Customer Cloud Service.
Leading the charge in adopting these advanced AI features, Gas South is partnering with Oracle to explore optimal deployment strategies. “At Gas South, we are always looking for new ways to leverage data and automation to deliver better service, improve efficiency, and support our employees,” said Greg Dunavant, Vice President of Customer Operations at Gas South. “We are excited to integrate new AI capabilities, with a focus on enhancing the customer experience, empowering our agents, and driving continuous improvement across our organization.” Gas South serves nearly half a million customers across 14 states, making it an ideal partner for testing these advancements.
Transforming Customer-Agent Interactions with AI
Oracle’s new AI capabilities are designed to tackle some of the most common challenges facing utility call centers today, including long wait times, inconsistent customer service, and inefficient, error-prone data capture. By introducing advanced listening tools, agents will be able to focus on customer interactions without the distraction of manual documentation. This innovation helps agents anticipate customer needs, resolve issues proactively, and improve overall service speed. Furthermore, these improvements are expected to lower the total average handle time, ultimately enhancing the utilities’ average speed of answer (ASA) to meet demanding service-level agreements.
Many utility companies struggle with data limitations, which often hinder their ability to gain insight into factors influencing call volumes and customer inquiries. Traditionally, utilities rely on interactive voice response (IVR) selections or post-call agent categorization to understand these dynamics. The new AI functionality in Oracle’s platform introduces automatic call tagging, enabling utilities to track specific issues such as billing concerns, service interruptions, and other unique customer inquiries. This feature offers greater flexibility, allowing utilities to tailor categories to their needs, monitor seasonal fluctuations, and gain a deeper understanding of the causes behind changes in call volume.
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Additional Key AI Features to Support Call Centers
The expanded AI capabilities within Oracle’s Customer Platform include several cutting-edge features designed to enhance both efficiency and security:
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Industry Terminology Recognition: The AI accurately identifies commonly used industry-specific jargon and corporate language to create more contextually relevant and precise call summaries.
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Protection of Personally Identifiable Information (PII): The AI automatically removes PII from call summaries to ensure customer privacy and compliance with utility policies. Agents retain the flexibility to modify summaries when necessary.
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Obscenity and Noise Filtering: The AI filters out background noise and irrelevant language, ensuring that the call summaries reflect only the most relevant and professional aspects of customer-agent interactions.
“Utility call centers are under constant pressure to manage high call volumes and deliver fast, accurate service that meets customer expectations, but they’ve often lacked the real-time tools needed to succeed,” said James Steadman, Global Head of Customer Product Strategy, Oracle Utilities. “These new AI features are designed to equip agents with crucial tools and insights to address customer issues faster than ever. AI can truly transform customer operations. If we can help reduce spending on customer operations by 20-30%—an estimated $124 billion industry-wide annually—that could translate to savings of up to $37 billion across the sector.”
Expanding Access to AI Innovations for All Customers
While these AI advancements are built directly into Oracle’s Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) offerings, on-premises customers can also access them via an extensive set of APIs. Looking ahead, Oracle plans to introduce AI-generated customer snapshots for agents before calls begin, improving response times and enhancing customer engagement. Additionally, Oracle aims to integrate full call transcripts to automatically generate detailed summaries for agents, minimizing manual processes and improving the accuracy of call notes. These tools will also assist call center managers in analyzing trends, monitoring performance, and facilitating agent training and quality assurance.
Oracle continues to evolve its Customer Platform, working on even more innovations that will further streamline utility operations, reduce operating costs, and elevate customer service across the industry.
By bringing AI directly into the workflow, Oracle is not only supporting the growth of smarter utility call centers but also ensuring a future where customer experience remains at the forefront of service delivery.
