Launching Etty – AI bot on whatsapp.

1.1 Project description

This project was developed to integrate the already existing AI bot of HDFC Life on the
website and application named Etty on the WhatsApp platform. This offered a number of
operations like Online Premium Payment, Policy Status, Annual Premium Statement, etc.
This was to facilitate the reduced offline interaction of HDFC Life with the customers due to
COVID-19. Although this was not the only reason or motivation but it was certainly the
emergency trigger point to launch the project on the priority basis.

1.2  Project Objectives

The main objective of this project was to enable and help customers to get their work done on
their fingertips through WhatsApp via an AI bot. This project helps reduce the human
struggle and traffic in the insurance offices, no customer will have to visit the office from afar
just to get done with a small task like policy premium payment.

This simplifies even the simplified form of the task getting done over website and mobile
application, as it is easier to complete it via WhatsApp rather than downloading or visiting
the website. This will, in a way, increase the insurance penetration in India as it will motivate
the customers and prospective customers by stating that it is not anymore a headache to carry
necessary operations in-person.

1.3 Project Key Deliverables

The entire project of launching Etty is divided into multiple project key deliverables. The key
deliverables of this project are:

1. Solve the problem and queries of users efficiently.

2. Reduce human interaction in the office by transferring that traffic to WhatsApp bot
Etty.
3. Automate and fasten the servicing touchpoint.
4. Increase customer satisfaction.
5. Reduce repeat complaints and customer send backs.

1.4 Organisation Strategies

The strategy of HDFC Life was to launch the Etty on WhatsApp at the earliest. The reason
for the same was because of surge of COVID-19 cases and lockdown, the customers were not
able to go to the physical offices for any query or getting their work done. Moreover, not all
the customers are tech savvy to get their work done from the website or mobile application.
So, this WhatsApp AI chatbot was an easy and more convenient alternative for the customers.
HDFC Life was not only eager to launch the WhatsApp AI bot, but it was also focusing on
the performance and reliance on the same. They did not want to launch the bot and then hit a
dead end where they could not make the necessary changes easily after the launch, just to
launch it hastily and as early as possible.

Project Description

2.1  Scope

The project included launching of the WhatsApp AI bot named Etty. This included the
research, script writing of Etty, testing and dry run.

This was researched and created by collaborative efforts of the Digital Operations and
Research team of HDFC Life and IT team of TCS. The project was to be completed within
one year and within the budget of INR 70,00,000.

2.2  Project Parameters

The project had a schedule of one year and budget of INR 70,00,000.

In that the budget of research team was INR 5,00,000 and the research task was to be
completed within 2 months of the initiation of the project. After that, the Operations team co-
ordinated with the research team and developed a map along with scripts that had to be
integrated with the Etty. This was to be completed within 2 months of being handed the
research data and the budget to develop the map and script of Etty was INR 7,00,000. This
entire map was then shared with the TCS IT team which created Etty from the technical side.
Etty was to be created by the IT team within 6 months of being handed the script and map
and was to be completed in the budget of INR 50,00,000. Post that, the testing and operations
team had to carry out the dry run and testing of the performance of Etty and resolve any
errors if occurred. This task was to be completed within 2 months and budget for the same
was INR 8,00,000.

2.3  Deliverables and Milestones

Deliverables:

1. Adding policy specific capabilities.

2. Generic capabilities.
3. Launching within the timeline.

Milestones:

1. Requirement Gathering
2. Stakeholder signoff
3. Development
4. Testing
 5. Deployment

2.4 Technical Requirements:

Technical requirements were to be taken care of by the TCS IT team. HDFC Life outsourced
the technical aspect from TCS.

2.5 Limits and Exclusions:

Limits included time and budget constraints.

The entire budget of launching, developing and creating Etty was INR 70,00,000. This
included developing Etty right from scratch to the testing and deployment. The time
constraint was to complete the entire project from research to deployment within one year
starting from 12th December, 2018 to 12th December, 2019. However, the project got
completed well within the limit on 11th November, 2019.

Exclusions:

The exclusions included group policies, buying of policies, policy pay-out and discontinuing
the existing policies.

2.6  Customer Review

The customers liked this development a lot and there has been a noticeable amount of
increase in the insurance penetration of HDFC Life. The main reason the customers liked the
development was because it was very easy to perform the tasks on WhatsApp through Etty
which were instead boring and lengthy tasks via traditional brick and mortar channel. Also it
was easier to get things done through WhatsApp instead of downloading mobile application
or web surfing as not all the customers are that technically sound.

2.7  Project priorities Matrix

In project priorities matrix first project aspect is Time, as we know in our project we need to
complete it in time as HDFC Life already needed Etty for giving better experience to their
customers. So, time was constrained for this project.

Second project aspect is Cost, as we now HDFC Life has given 70,00,000 INR to complete
this project which is fairly enough money to complete this project, HDFC Life should have
also given more money if needed, So based on this we can say Cost is accepted.

Our third project aspect is performance, HDFC Life wanted to make Etty – AI Bot on
WhatsApp for batter experience of their customers, they want to provide simple solutions to
some problems of their customers, So for these reasons they need make Etty highly enhanced.
 TIME COST PERFORMANCE

CONTSTRAIN

ENHANCE

ACCEPT

2.8  Possible constraints

Following are possible constraints for our project

 Time
 Cost
 Resources
 Technical support
 Customer satisfaction

Project Estimate .........................................................................................................................

3.1  Estimate for Time

The estimate of time in which the project must be completed from scratch to deployment is
considered in this section. For HDFC Life’s project of launching Etty, the time frame
estimated was one year. In which first 2 months will be for research, after that 2 months will
be for map and script of the Etty, than 6 months for creating Etty and after that 2 months for
testing.

3.2  Estimate for Cost

The estimate of cost within which the project must be completed from scrath to deployment
is considered in this section. For HDFC Life’s project of launching Etty, the budget estimated
was INR 70,00,000. Below is the table for complete bifurcation of the cost.

Project Task Project

Cost(INR)
Research 5,00,000

Map and Script 7,00,000

50,00,000
Testing 8,00,000