Transfers Disambiguation

Training a financial services chatbot to handle money transfers

Call center records and data from our online search feature had showed that users frequently called in for information about money transfers. We found a variety of topics users were asking about.

Transfer between my accounts

Transfer to another member

One-time immediate transfer

Automatic credit card payments

Add an account for transfer

Edit an existing recurring transfer

Over several months, we had trained the bot with responses covering the transfer-related topics above, among others. The bot’s language understanding ability is largely based on keywords in the user’s message. As a result, each time we added a new response for a topic within the wide category of transfers, the bot’s comprehension suffered.

The more responses we added that could be triggered by the keyword “transfer,” the more potential options the bot had to choose from, and the more confused it became.

In analyzing a user’s incoming message or “utterance,” the bot relies on keyword recognition, but also on analysis of syntax, word order, length of the utterance, and other factors. From this, the bot would identify potentially relevant responses, each accompanied by a confidence score.

If a response’s score fell below a certain threshold, that response was ruled out. If none of the responses scored high enough (or if multiple responses met the threshold), the bot would deliver the None Intent response (“I don’t understand”).

Sorry, I can't help with that yet - I'm still learning. Please try wording your question differently or asking something else. You can also choose a topic below or type 'agent' to chat with a live person.

When the team requested language for a bot response regarding external transfers, I pointed out the problems that the numerous transfer-related responses were causing. Our analysts agreed that we had reached a point where the bot was delivering the None Intent almost any time the term “transfer” appeared in a user’s utterance.

I proposed consolidating the transfer-related responses in order to reduce the number of options the bot had to choose from. Many of them shared a common hyperlink to our Transfers feature, and others directed users to a link on that Transfers screen - one tap away.

Visit our Transfers center. From there, you can:

1. Move money between your accounts

2. Transfer to other members

3. Register non-Navy Federal accounts for external transfers

4. Initiate external transfers

5. Make credit card and loan payments

6. Set up automatic and recurring transfers

7. View and manage previously scheduled transfers

Some supplementary details about external transfers and registering transfer accounts was excluded by this response, so I added selectable buttons leading to that extra information.

As a result, the chatbot’s overall comprehension increased by 25% and its accuracy with transfer-related requests increased by 90%.

Error Messaging

Credit Card Authorized User