Introducing Commercial Bank of Dubai’s Virtual Banking Assistant

By Björn Gülsdorff, Head of Business Development

Customer experience has become a key differentiator for organisations, particularly in the very competitive financial services space. And so when Commercial Bank of Dubai (CBD), a provider of personal and corporate banking services in the United Arab Emirates, began a redesign of their website they looked to intelligent virtual agent technology to create an innovative and personalised experience online.

The result is a new banking portal featuring Virtual Banking Assistant Sara. The sophisticated natural language technology powering “Ask Sara” allows the virtual assistant to engage conversationally with website visitors 24/7. Sara assists visitors of the public website as well as CBD’s logged-in customers with tasks such as form completion and is integrated with live chat to seamlessly escalate users needing further assistance. The animated avatar engages with users by waving and tapping on the screen after a period of inactivity and, when used after hours, appears in a darkened office. And on mobile devices users interact with a special HTML5 interface to cater for the reduced screen size – all powered by one knowledgebase.

The creation of “Ask Sara” has been a joint effort for Creative Virtual’s UK and Netherlands teams in close cooperation with CBD’s business team and is our first V-Person™ implementation in the region. Shortly after the official launch in March, CBD’s Sara received a positive review in an Emirates 24|7 article. She’ll also be one of the virtual agents we’ll be showcasing during the upcoming FStech Omnichannel Banking Conference in London next month.

“Ask Sara” can be accessed via the red Virtual Assistant tab on the right side of the CBD website.