Canarian Government boosts 012 information service with WhatsApp AI assistant

The Canarian Government plans to boost its 012 information and assistance service with a WhatsApp service assisted by AI.

Guadalupe González Taño, the Director General of Digital Transformation, showed Canarian President Fernando Clavijo around the 012 services base in Tenerife yesterday, where she explained the new service.

476 employees at the 012 service attended over seven million calls across the Canary Islands last year, with 65% of calls relating to healthcare appointments. One of the more recent additions is a confirmation service, reminding patients of their appointments and allowing them to cancel and reassign the appointment.

The new WhatsApp service is currently being developed, and will allow communication with a chatbot, which will take clients through a decision tree. If the client wishes to transfer to a human operator, they will be able to do so.