ANZ debuts chatbot to experiment with AI

afr.com:

ANZ has built a new chatbot powered by generative-AI called Z-GPT that can use massive datasets adapted by its own engineers to understand detailed and bespoke information specific to its customers and the bank.

ANZ, like other major banks, is lifting investment in AI software, and expecting a pay-off from finding efficiencies across its banking operations. Initially, applications of emerging generative AI tools in banks will be used for helping staff find answers to questions.

Tim Hogarth, ANZ CTO: “We have a backlog of suggestions and formal experiments, looking at efficiency and productivity gains.” 

Z-GPT – as it’s known for now – can allow a banker to type in a simple question, using casual language, into their desktop, with the answer generated from data stored in various ANZ IT systems.

The bank is currently testing it to help staff answer a question like “what is the rate of interest paid on the ANZ Simplicity Plus home loan” given a particular borrower’s deposit.

ANZ hopes to extend deployment to help bankers do their day jobs more effectively. This will reduce the need for internal teams to generate various reports, and have to amend them when bankers want more detail.

“One of the things we think it will be able to do is answering natural language questions, such as, ‘How many payments have we processed in the last 24 hours?’,” says ANZ’s chief technology officer Tim Hogarth.

“For generating reports, you won’t need to do technical work to turn an English statement into a database query, get the results, and turn it back to English. You will end up with natural language interfaces for traditionally more reporting-based tools.”

ANZ is also conducting AI experiments to create copy for internal websites, compare