E.ON One: AI Solution for the Energy Industry

Long wait times, sometimes frustrated customers, and overwhelmed service center employees: Since the start of the energy crisis, the phones in call centers have been ringing off the hook – the topic of energy is creating a significant need for consultation. Recurring issues can now be resolved much faster with a specially trained voicebot. “OneVoice” provides quick, competent, around-the-clock assistance and guarantees no wait times for tasks such as meter readings, installment changes, or reporting disruptions. Ruth Engemann, Senior Product Manager AI & Voice at E.ON One, explains the background of this innovation in an interview.

Cloudmagazine: Could you please provide an overview of the main functions of OneVoice and explain how the solution simplifies customer communication for energy suppliers?

Ruth Engemann: OneVoice from E.ON One is a voicebot that uses artificial intelligence to automate the handling of inquiries and requests over the phone for energy suppliers and network operators. By addressing simple customer requests without wait times and hassle, OneVoice provides valuable support for both customers and energy suppliers and municipal utilities alike.

The significant advantage of our product lies in the fact that we have already pre-configured and trained many classic use cases such as meter reading reports, installment changes, or fault reports. This drastically shortens the implementation time for our customers. As a result, an ecosystem is created where all customers of our product benefit from the advancements of our central OneVoice portfolio.

What specific challenges in customer service led to the development of OneVoice, particularly in the context of the energy market? 

The energy crisis has led to an increase in incoming customer calls to the customer service departments and contact centers of many energy suppliers, resulting in longer wait times and frustrating experiences for customers on one hand, and an overload of work for customer service representatives on the other. Additionally, the general shortage of skilled workers makes it particularly difficult for service centers to recruit the necessary customer service agents.

Telephony remains the preferred service channel for many energy suppliers. To ensure customer satisfaction and provide reliable service, there is an urgent need for automation in this channel. In addition to cost savings, the primary goal is to create a satisfactory service for customers and to relieve customer service representatives in their daily work.

What types of customer interactions or inquiries can OneVoice handle most effectively? Are there specific examples of complex scenarios that the system manages successfully?

In principle, all customer interactions can be processed via OneVoice. As mentioned earlier, we have many classic use cases preconfigured and trained, which significantly shortens the implementation time for customers.

Many voicebots have previously been unable to perform real-time verification of information provided by customers because they were not connected to the CRM system. This affected, for example, the verification of a meter reading. OneVoice, on the other hand, is connected to the respective CRM backend system and can therefore immediately inform the customer if the transmitted meter reading appears implausible, for example because the previous meter reading was higher.

How does OneVoice ensure it correctly understands and responds to industry-specific terminology?

OneVoice is an energy industry solution for the energy industry. At E.ON One, we are familiar with all the typical terms and technical jargon used in the energy sector. This allows us to pretrain the AI model with synonyms – a labor-intensive process that would otherwise fall to the customer.

Regarding scalability and adaptability, how does OneVoice plan to address future developments in the energy market or changing customer needs?

To address future developments in the energy market and changing customer needs, we collaborate closely with our clients and conduct our own research into future trends and regulatory changes in the energy sector. Based on these insights, we maintain a OneVoice backlog where we collect use cases that could be relevant for our customers in the future.

Our core team develops these use cases as needed and with the appropriate urgency, making them available through the OneVoice ecosystem. One specific example is dynamic electricity tariffs: We know that energy suppliers will be required to offer such tariffs from 2025 onwards. Therefore, we are already working on corresponding use cases, such as FAQs about dynamic tariffs, to optimally prepare our customers for these changes.

What key metrics or results have you observed since implementing OneVoice? Can you share any success stories or significant improvements in customer satisfaction?

One of our external clients, EWR AG in Worms, uses OneVoice for customer service. From the start of implementation in June 2024 until the first go-live of route recognition, just under 2 ½ months elapsed. Since mid-October, they have also gone live with the use cases meter reading submission, installment change, and change bank details – the entire integration, including backend binding, took only 4 ½ months. This is a great success story that also highlights how efficiently the collaboration between various internal departments has worked. EWR AG achieves nearly 90% accuracy in issue recognition, which underscores the quality of our product.

Source title image: Freepik / DC Studio