Collections
Project Description: Connect customer payment inquiries to account records so AI can prepare reply drafts. Collections staff review and send responses, with disputes routed for further investigation.
Implementation effort
120–464staff hours total
Current workload
—staff hours / month
Net time saved
—staff hours / month
Project difficulty
Moderate
Implementation work
Define supported inquiries and reply controls16–56h
- Define five inquiry types, identity checks and approved reply content; distinguish routine requests from disputes.
- Assign reply approvers and escalation owners; agree what account information the workflow may disclose.
Connect the inbox and customer records24–96h
- Connect one shared inbox and a read-only customer/invoice source; verify account identifiers and data freshness.
- Label 100 historical inquiries and expected responses; keep development and test cases separate.
Configure reply drafting and escalation32–128h
- Route supported inquiries and draft replies using the relevant customer's account records.
- Include account references and an activity record; require staff approval and escalate disputes.
Test account accuracy and data access32–128h
- Test disputed balances, missing records and misleading requests; check that customers cannot see each other's information.
- Rehearse reviewer decisions, correct failed responses and rerun the affected cases.
Train collectors and launch16–56h
- Train up to five staff to verify drafts, approve replies and escalate exceptions; document manual fallback.
- Monitor a bounded live pilot and resolve remaining issues before release.
Ongoing work
Maintain collections workflows40–160h / yr
- Sample draft quality and account-data freshness; update supported responses and source mappings.
- Retest customer isolation, permissions and escalation after source, ERP or model changes.
Further projects
- Extend replies to additional entities, languages or inquiry types.
- Add payment-pattern analysis to investigate recurring disputes or delays.