When the customer’s AI makes the call.

A model that stood still

For most of its history, the contact centre has worked the same way. A customer calls, waits and speaks to a person. Technology arrived in layers: menus, scripts and chatbots, usually bought from one supplier and fitted around people from another. The model underneath barely moved.

At VKY, our developers and our contact centre teams work side by side. We develop our AI in-house, inside a live operation, and that gives us a clear view of what is coming next, because we see it on real calls first.

Three changes, already under way

1. 01

   Now: AI in the contact centre

   AI agents handle simple, routine requests, and colleagues begin more of their calls with the customer identified and the reason for the call already captured. People stay in charge of anything that needs judgement, and of anything regulation says a person must do.

2. 02

   Next: customers bring their own AI

   Personal AI agents will chase renewals, compare quotes and change cover on a customer’s behalf. Contact centres will need to recognise them, work with them and know when to hand the conversation to a person.

3. 03

   Then: AI meets AI

   The customer’s AI and the organisation’s AI will complete routine journeys between themselves. People will focus on the moments that need judgement, empathy and authority.

Three questions every regulated firm will need to answer

1. 01IdentificationIs this the customer, or their AI agent? And which agent?
2. 02AuthenticationCan we verify both the customer and the agent acting for them?
3. 03DelegationWhat has the customer authorised it to do: a quote, a change of cover, a cancellation?

None of these has a settled answer yet. Open standards that let AI agents talk to each other are arriving quickly, and the firms that think about identity and consent now will be ready when their customers’ agents start calling.

What it means for people

As AI takes on the routine, the work that remains needs more skill, not less. We expect new roles to grow inside every contact centre: colleagues who supervise AI live and make the judgement calls, specialists who resolve complex cases, quality managers who review AI and human work to the same standard, and AI agent builders, a career path open to team leaders.

Pay should rise with that skill. The best contact centres of the next decade will be the most expert, not the most automated.

Why we develop our AI ourselves

Because the people who design our AI sit alongside the people who use it. They hear the calls, see where customers get stuck and design around it. Our AI tells customers it is AI, and hands over to a person with everything that has already been said.

And every change is tried with one or two teams first, reviewed against real results, before it goes any further.

Practical, not theoretical: AI developed in a live contact centre, not in a lab.

The direction is clear. The detail isn’t.

No one knows exactly what this technology will look like in five years. But the early signals are already here, and we would rather help shape the answer than wait for it.

We will share what we learn here, as we learn it.