Chatting with QuickBooks’ virtual assistant:

Streamlining Small Business Accounting with the QuickBooks Virtual Assistant

QuickBooks, the leading accounting software for small businesses, processes sensitive financial data and transactions for millions of users. Answering customer questions in a timely, accurate manner is crucial, especially during periods like tax time.

To augment support capabilities, Intuit has equipped QuickBooks Online and the QuickBooks Mobile app with a Virtual Assistant chatbot. Powered by AI conversation technology, this virtual agent can answer common accounting and bookkeeping questions 24/7 through intuitive chat.

In this article, we’ll examine use cases where the QuickBooks Virtual Assistant helps users, the technology behind it, benefits for customers and support staff, how it complements human agents, and tips for getting the most value from this AI-powered helper. Let’s explore how conversational interfaces are transforming the QuickBooks user experience.

How the QuickBooks Virtual Assistant Assists Users

The QuickBooks Virtual Assistant helps customers by answering common questions across several categories:

– Accounting fundamentals – Explanations of concepts like debits vs credits, chart of accounts, fiscal year, reconciling, etc.

– Product features – How certain functions in QuickBooks Online or Desktop work. For example, invoicing, inventory, reports, managing users.

– Transactions – Guidance on recording specific transaction types like expenses, invoices, credit memos.

– Setup steps – Instructions for initial configuration and import, adding accounts, categorizing transactions.

– Troubleshooting – Help diagnosing issues like a mismatched balance sheet, a locked out user, or sync errors.

– Errors – Interpreting common error messages and recommended fixes.

– Reports – Generating specific reports and customizing report options.

– Navigation – Where to find certain menus or options within QuickBooks Online or Desktop.

Having a conversational assistant that can address these frequent questions helps customers resolve issues immediately without needing to dig through documentation or wait for support. The Virtual Assistant acts as a QuickBooks expert at their fingertips 24/7.

Technology Behind the Virtual Assistant

To deliver helpful responses, Intuit infused the QuickBooks Virtual Assistant with:

– Natural language processing – Understands the intent and context of customer questions typed in natural language.

– Dialog trees – Follows logical conversational flows based on query types.

– Context awareness – References details like the user’s QuickBooks version and configuration.

– Integrations – Can surface helpful sections from QuickBooks help documentation.

– Machine learning – Continuously improves from user interactions and agent feedback.

– Sentiment analysis – Detects user frustration to escalate to a human agent.

Combining these technical capabilities allows the bot to have natural, context-aware conversations that resolve customer needs.

Benefits for QuickBooks Users

The QuickBooks Virtual Assistant empowers customers in a few key ways:

– Convenient access – Get QuickBooks help anytime without waiting for support.

– Fast answers – Common questions resolved in seconds rather than minutes.

– Consistent guidance – Answers don’t vary like with human reps.

– 24/7 availability – Support at any hour of day critical during peak periods.

– Self-service – Simple tasks handled without agent transfers.

– Reduced effort – Chat interface easier than searching help docs.

– Personalized tips – Context-aware responses tailored to each user.

– Proactive assistance – Bot can offer suggestions rather than just react.

Together this provides small businesses a frictionless way to get accounting help when needed.

Advantages for Customer Support Teams

For QuickBooks’ customer support staff, the Virtual Assistant delivers advantages like:

– Deflecting routine tickets – Handling common queries the bot frees up agents.

– Improving first-contact resolution – Simple issues resolved without agent transfers.

– Providing 24/7 support coverage – No off-hours staffing required.

– Enabling quicker onboarding – Bots handle new user basic questions.

– Centralizing knowledge – Agent insights feed the bot’s knowledge base.

– Boosting productivity – Removing repetitive tasks lets agents focus on complex issues and relationship-building.

– Expanding multilingual support – Chatbots add additional language capabilities.

Overall this elevates the support team’s capabilities for assisting customers.

Complementing Human Agents

To optimize the user experience, Intuit designed seamless handoffs between the Virtual Assistant and live support:

– users can request an agent at any time

– the bot transfers to an agent when confidence in response is low

– sessions transfer after multiple failed responses to a query

– the bot provides context summaries when handing off chats

This ensures users get the best of both worlds – convenient self-service paired with human expertise when needed.

Tips for Leveraging the QuickBooks Virtual Assistant

To maximize value from the QuickBooks Virtual Assistant, customers should:

– Give the bot a try for frequent questions before contacting support.

– Be direct. Avoid vague descriptions. Provide concise queries.

– Start with basics before assuming bot capabilities. Gauge its knowledge.

– Have your QuickBooks account open to reference transaction details.

– Follow the bot’s conversational cues and prompts.

– Let the bot transfer you to an agent if stuck.

– Provide feedback via “Was this helpful?” buttons to improve responses.

– Consult the bot’s catalog of conversation topics it can address.

Adopting these tips will enhance users’ positive experience with this AI-powered accounting assistant.

The Future of Conversational Apps

Looking ahead, expect Intuit to expand the QuickBooks Virtual Assistant’s capabilities even further by:

– expanding the topics and queries it can handle

– integrating deeper with QuickBooks to surface personalized data

– adding proactive notifications and forecasting based on transactions

– supporting additional platforms like mobile messaging

– adopting new multimodal abilities like taking photos of receipts

– enhancing handoffs and workflows with human agents

Conversational interfaces like Intuit’s QuickBooks Virtual Assistant are transforming how customers interact with business apps by enabling more intuitive, contextual experiences. Eliminating friction through AI establishes stronger connections between technology and users for solving problems together.