How Chatbots can make Government Agencies provide amazing Customer Experience

When one thinks of industries that are high tech, local government likely does not figure anywhere on the list. In fact, local government is often synonymous with the exact opposite of up to date technology.

This is a huge problem, that must be fixed.

While it is easy to get caught up in the glamor of national level politics, it is in the recesses of local government that we find the services which impact daily life. As a result poor technology at this level, results in tangible inconveniences in the lives of millions.

Consider visits to the DMV(Department of Motor Vehicles) as an example. Talk to most people about their opinions on the DMV and they will likely complain to you about the long lines, slow service and confusing forms that are near ubiquitous across the country. I’m even willing to bet that you have had such an experience at a DMV. This should not be the case. The services offered by local government offices like the DMV are required to carry out basic tasks in every day life and should be easy to access (e.g. licenses are used for address proof and photo id).

Thankfully for us as private citizens, a few pioneering governments around the country are recognising this problem and are trying to improve the experience.

How Montana DMV uses Chatbots

In 2017, Levi Worts, a writer and Public Information Officer at the Montana Department of Justice undertook an ambitious project to overhaul the state Motor Vehicle Division’s website (this is Montana’s equivalent of the DMV).

When he began the project, the website was exactly what one would expect from an average DMV : several densely-packed webpages and a some equally dense pdfs. Levi recognised that the inconvenience of finding information on such a website was likely causing many to abandon their web based searches in favour of calling their local DMV to get their doubts clarified. As you might imagine, these calls are, for the most part, unpleasant experiences.

Understaffed and underfunded government offices often lack the resources to hire more employees to field queries, resulting in the same problems that many face when they physically go into a DMV (long wait times, slow service, etc). As if that wasn’t bad enough, Montana’s rapidly growing population meant that the problem was only worsening every year. Recognising this problem, Levi decided to take what many would consider, an unconventional route.

The Shift with the introduction of Chatbots

Levi decided that rather than fixing the website pages that already existed, he was going to replace them with an army of chatbots.

When you think about it, such a solution makes sense. If you have any experience in customer support, you will know that the vast majority of questions individuals ask are basic queries and repetitive in nature. It is only the complex edge cases which truly require a human’s intervention. In fact, it is likely the situation that Montana’s old website had a majority of the answers people were calling in to check. But, a combination of boring website design and short attention spans was rendering this information, useless.

Montana government’s issue to begin with was one of poor UX. Taking the information already available on a site and organising it so that it is navigable through a chatbot does no change to the information being provided. However, it does change the way that information is accessed.

In other words, the shift from a traditional website to a chatbot is nothing more than a radical UI change.

Why chatbots?

Making a shift to chatbots has three significant advantages over a traditional website :

1. First, chat interfaces are ubiquitous the world over, so every one knows how to use one if they encounter it. Messaging has become such a fundamental utility for communication in modern life that people regardless of demographic group can navigate a chat interface. Even my 80 year old grandparents use WhatsApp to keep in touch with me.
2. Second, chat interfaces are mobile optimised, right out of the box. Since traditional websites drastically differ from one another, the process of optimising them often needs individualised attention for different webpages. Your FAQ page looks different form your home page, and as such needs different optimisations to make it work well on mobile. With chat interfaces, however, the basic UI template remains the same, regardless of where in the flow a user finds themselves. Whether you are checking the car registration branch of the chat or the license renewal branch, you will see a an input box and some message bubbles dotting the screen.
3. Third, and finally, people are simply more comfortable having a conversation than using a website. Even though a bot is not truly a human being, the use of a chat interface makes individuals feel like they are talking to an entity which is actively engaging with them and can adapt to their needs. This is because where traditional websites are passive and one has to actively click through links and read through large bodies of text, the back and forth interaction of a chatbot mimics the sort of interaction one might have on a phone call. This makes individuals more likely to continue their interaction till they find their answer, than if they were using a traditional website.

The Results of using a Chatbot

Today, when you land on the Montana Motor Vehicle Division’s website, you will be greeted by the smiling face of a friendly robot named BEN, prompting you to start a conversation.

BEN (which stands for Bot Enhanced Navigation), presents you with several options on what you can do, and will take you to the exact resource you need.

So far, the bots have been quite successful. In their first five months alone, they have reduced the average number of monthly calls by an average of 1700. They have also received over 600 5* ratings with an average rating of 4/5.

In fact, the initiative has been so successful that it has received really good press attention in the Government Tech space.

- Montana’s New Chatbots Provide Major Benefits to Residents, Government

- Montana deploys chatbot fleet, eliminating thousands of support calls

- Montana test-drives code-free chatbots

Suffice it to say, Levi’s efforts have not been wasted. His project serves as a template for other governments around the country to better help their citizens get the services they need with the use of Chatbots.