AI shakes up the call centre industry, but some tasks are still better left to the humans

Armen Kirakosian remembers the frustrations of his first job as a call centre agent nearly 10 years ago: the aggravated customers, the constant searching through menus for information and the notes he had to physically write for each call he handled.

Thanks to artificial intelligence, the 29-year-old from Athens, Greece, is no longer writing notes or clicking on countless menus. He often has full customer profiles in front of him when a person calls in and may already know what problem the customer has before even saying “hello.” He can spend more time actually serving the customer.