“No wrong door” with the COVID-19 chatbot

As the COVID-19 pandemic spread worldwide in 2020, people in B.C. needed trusted, clear and up-to-date information. Government had to make sure that information spanning topics like restrictions on travel, school closures, financial supports, treatments and vaccinations reached as many people as possible and was available in a format and reading level that all people in B.C could find and understand. Government’s approach was omni-channel, meaning that anyone could go to B.C. government channels to get accurate information in real time.

This meant coordinating information across channels like the telephone and the web and trying new ways to help people. One new way was to use the COVID-19 chatbot, a tool that allowed people to ask questions and find information in a different way, and as an alternative to searching or browsing web content or waiting in a telephone queue.

Government’s day to day approach

The B.C. government’s focus was on keeping gov.bc.ca content aligned and in step with government announcements. It would then be amplified and shared through social media and media partners, in many cases also posted in 14 languages.

Service BC offices and call centre staff would be made aware of new information to help them manage questions. In addition to government’s Service BC call centre and in-person services, a chatbot would be available 24/7 to provide answers to any pandemic questions. The COVID-19 chatbot could quickly connect people with accurate and up-to-date information that was available on government’s website.

Finger on the pulse

The chatbot’s artificial intelligence (AI) component allowed people to ask questions in their own words, with slang or “fuzzy” terms, and get a response based on a knowledge base derived from government’s web content.

Some examples of the types of questions people asked in their own words:

• “Do u still need to isolate if u are positive for covid?”
  • Provided with BCCDC content for people with symptoms of COVID-19
• “is handshake still taboo re covid”
  • Provided with BCCDC content for staying safe during the pandemic
• “Do you have a app for phones?”
  • Linked to the BCCDC COVID-19 self-assessment tool
• “sick but tested (-) for Covid-19”
  • Linked to the BCCDC COVID-19 testing FAQ

New questions and answers were reviewed and added daily based on the latest web content, public questions coming into call centres, web analytics, and social media. Once the chatbot launched, the team would review what we were hearing to learn more about what was top of mind for people around the province. This created a new way for government to listen to and understand what information the public was looking for. This also highlights the importance of web content being up to date and accurate to avoid the risk of misinformation being provided.

At the height of COVID-19, these updates happened daily in response to surges of new questions and government announcements. This allowed government and the B.C. Centre for Disease Control (BCCDC) to instantly handle thousands of questions as the public eagerly awaited the latest information from the Provincial Health Officer or Minister of Health. The chatbot provided an “instant-on” capacity to respond, including when multiple high priority events (like flooding or wildfires) were occurring.

The team’s philosophy was that there should be “no wrong door” for finding information or answers – in addition to the web, telephone and in-person services, the chatbot would appear on gov.bc.ca, the BCCDC website and healthlinkbc.ca, providing the same answers regardless of which site the visitor started on, and always pointing people to trusted, useful and accurate government approved information.

Since the chatbot helped people find information online without direct human assistance, this approach was designed to help reduce wait times on Service BC phone lines, leaving call centre staff more time and attention to devote to more challenging situations and questions. A true win-win.

The future of chatbot

After tens of millions of page views and over two million questions asked on the COVID-19 chatbot, SBC/GDX has leveraged what they learned to prototype, experiment and kickstart further use of chatbots by government.

The team at Service SBC/GDX continues to support the COVID-19 chatbot while pivoting to create a more generic chatbot focused on answering questions about common government services and programs. This new ‘Service Navigator’ chatbot helps visitors access commonly requested government programs and services beyond COVID-19 information. It also enables government to continuously gather input and feedback from the public for services they are looking for.

There are other future opportunities as well, like watching how the private sector is experimenting with automated hand-offs to live support, improved handling of multilingual questions, broadening the chatbot model to include any or all government services, and expanding the “no wrong door” strategy to provide the public with consistent information regardless of channel.

Chatbots may not replace other information channels, but whether in a crisis or on a typical day, they can significantly improve the experience for people who prefer to find information by asking questions instead of navigating web content. Teams like the one at SBC/GDX will continue to create an omni-channel approach, use public questions to analyze information gaps, create trustworthy information and explore the use of chatbot and AI to support self-serve experiences for the evolving needs of the people of British Columbia.

To learn more about what’s next for the chatbot team, BC Public Service employees can reach out to GDX.VirtualAssistant@gov.bc.ca.