In recent years, the role of chatbot help desk automation has evolved from simple technical support to a key driver of corporate innovation. This change has been significantly influenced by the integration of artificial intelligence.
Chatbot Help Desk Automation in IT Service Management
According to Gartner, by 2026, 70% of companies that adopt AI in their ITSM will see a significant improvement in their team’s productivity. In response to this trend, Bestway Europe, a global leader in the outdoor leisure industry, embarked on its digital transformation journey by implementing a Chatbot Help Desk Automation tool integrated into Microsoft Teams to support its employees.
Stefano Garzilli, IT Manager, and Christian Ferrarese, IT Specialist at Bestway, shared insights on the project during the Athics webinar, “AI in the IT Help Desk Service.”
The Challenge: Optimizing IT Support with Chatbot Help Desk Automation
“Bestway’s IT team consists of only three people, who support about 90 employees in the Bestway Europe and Bestway Italia offices. While not facing critical issues, managing support requests was becoming challenging, especially during peak times. We needed a solution to handle routine requests efficiently and free up the team to focus on more complex tasks”.
The solution was a Chatbot Help Desk Automation tool created with the Crafter.ai platform and integrated directly into Microsoft Teams. This “virtual colleague” is always available to solve common problems in real-time, lightening the IT team’s workload and maintaining a high level of efficiency.
The chatbot offers a simple and intuitive interaction, similar to that with a human operator. A key advantage is that the IT team no longer has to anticipate every possible scenario, as the AI interprets requests and generates appropriate responses even from general documentation.
Internal Adoption of Chatbot
A new technology only truly works when people learn to use it and consider it an integral part of their daily work. To encourage the adoption of Chatbot Help Desk Automation, Bestway presented it via the company intranet and integrated it as an application within Microsoft Teams. Short demonstration sessions were also organized during periodic meetings to illustrate the advantages and usage of the new tool.
This approach helped reduce internal resistance and stimulated employee interest and active involvement in adopting the new technology.
The Results of Help Desk Automation
Since implementing the Chatbot Help Desk Automation, Bestway has seen clear benefits:
- Increased Efficiency and Productivity: Employees receive immediate support for common IT issues, minimizing downtime. This has allowed the IT team to lighten the workload of first-level requests and focus on more complex problems and strategic projects.
- Improved User Experience: The integration of support directly into Microsoft Teams has made access simple and intuitive, leveraging a tool employees are already familiar with.
- Structured Management: Automatic escalation to Freshdesk ensures that all unresolved requests are still tracked and managed in a structured way.
Looking ahead, Bestway plans to extend the use of Chatbot Help Desk Automation to other departments, such as the HR department, which often handles similar requests for information on permits and sick leave, for example.
Why Athics?
“Athics immediately immersed themselves in our reality, offering us a personalized solution and showing us possible future developments. Two fundamental aspects were added to this: data control and protection. Their system is fully compliant with our guidelines, and a perimeter was created for the LLM within which the chatbot must respond, thus ensuring precision and security”.
— Stefano Garzilli, IT Manager Bestway Europe