This podcast episode is all about chatbots in the social insurance sector with Michel Guinot and Urs Wälchli from SVA Aargau. The SVA Aargau is a cantonal administration that deals with social security contributions. As a result, the contact center receives a large number of customer inquiries every day. They are in contact with a large number of customers, particularly in the area of premium reductions.

About Michel Guinot

Michel Guinot is head of premium reduction at SVA Aargau and was directly involved in the creation of the chatbot as project manager.

About Urs Wälchli

Urs Wälchli is a member of the management team at SVA Aargau and heads the cantonal benefits division, which includes supplementary benefits, premium reductions and other areas.

The SVA Aargau chatbot

SVA Aargau’s chatbot is called Maxi, which stands for maximum customer satisfaction. The trigger for the chatbot was the end-to-end automation and digitalization of premium reductions in the canton of Aargau. The canton of Aargau was the first in Switzerland to fully automate this process. SVA Aargau received the Digital Economy Award 2019 and the German Innovation Award 2020 for this and for the further development of its chatbot solutions.

The chatbot project summarized

As part of the digitalization project, the SVA Aargau found that it was still using traditional communication methods to inform applicants about the premium reduction. They wanted to eliminate this discrepancy in the customer experience.

Chatbots are suitable for answering a large volume of questions that are repetitive in nature. Conventional communication channels do not generate any added value for employees or customers. That was the decisive factor in looking for a new form of consulting. The chatbot ensures a seamless process and an optimal customer experience. This also allows resources to be reallocated from simple and recurring tasks.

Over 30 percent of inquiries have already been shifted to the chatbot channel and 95% of customers describe Maxi as successful and helpful.

Conceptualization and implementation

Initially, the premium reduction process was automated as part of an overall strategy. SVA Aargau has tackled the chatbot project together with a digital agency.

Internally, the requests were structured and analyzed in various categories, while the agency contacted various chatbot providers. It was important to the SVA Aargau that the software was easy to use so that the bots could be further developed and adapted without much effort. Data security was also a key concern for them. The choice for the software fell on aiaibot.

A clean data analysis and an analysis of the initial situation and customer needs are central to the development of a chatbot. A clean business case is also essential for this.

The SVA Aargau’s concept for success

Maxi is a rule-based chatbot. This guides users amazingly well through the conversation. For this purpose, an in-depth analysis was carried out, from which the standard questions could be extracted.

Dialogs were then developed on this basis. It was crucial that the users are always kept in dialog. This means that customers always receive a solution when they make an inquiry via the chatbot, which is also the key to the success of SVA Aargau’s chatbot. The landing page with the chatbot is also easy to find, which results in high user numbers for the bot.

The future of automation in social insurance

For Michel Guinot and Urs Wälchli, the topics of chatbots, AI and machine learning represent a shift in the entire social insurance industry. This change is accompanied by the fact that the needs of customers can be better recognized and the resulting benefits can be produced for them. This should also keep employees’ work exciting and varied and increase their marketability. A real win-win situation. The SVA Aargau hopes that its project will bring about future-oriented change in this sector.

It’s best to listen to the podcast episode with Sophie Hundertmark, Michel Guinot and Urs Wälchli for yourself. Have fun!

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