Log-in issues are a growing concern for both companies and consumers. As the use of websites and apps continues to grow, so does our list of passwords. In the article, ‘Average person uses 10 online passwords a day’, the author states that “One in three people are forced to resort to writing them (passwords) down, while another one in three forget them completely.”
Frustration over being locked out of an account is commonplace among online users. I would venture a guess that it is just as frustrating for companies. A locked-out customer is an unhappy customer. They can’t spend money, and, equally as bad, they have to call a customer-service professional to regain access – at a cost to the company. Not only has this interaction negatively affected the user’s experience, it also increases the risk that they will voice their opinion on one of the many social media outlets available, letting other customers know how frustrated they are.
It is important to remember why we have all of these passwords, usernames and security questions; in a word: protection. Using security questions backed up by live help worked when the average person had only an account or two to manage online, but now, this system just doesn’t scale. If a person has to write down their account info, doesn’t that de-value the purpose of having these security systems in place? With these limitations, what options are e-business leaders left with?
When people need help solving issues, conversation is the preferred modality. Natural-language understanding solutions, like Next IT’s Access Assistant, allow companies to create an identity-verification solution that’s conversational, but more secure than a session with a live representative, at a fraction of the cost. Unlike a live rep, Access Assistant can’t be swayed to give up additional information that could be used to illegitimately access an account. Access Assistant is flexible, too. To create a more seamless resolution to the issue, it can select from a variety of data elements in the user’s profile and adjust the number of correct answers needed before proceeding.
BECU, one of the nation’s largest credit unions, recently deployed Access Assistant on their site to help members accomplish tasks such as unlocking their account and retrieving their username or password. Through conversation, Access Assistant identifies the member’s issue and then walks them through a process of identification and verification before executing an action such as resetting their password.
The result? Users are able to converse with the system to better self-serve and quickly solve their log-in issues on their channel of choice.
