Difficulty in figuring out directions to your hotel? Need more information on check-in and check-out timings? Payment related queries? OYO’s chatbot – ‘Yo! Help’ is here to answer all your questions! 

To enable seamless customer experiences, right from the discovery process until the moment you check-out, we have launched OYO’s self-help tool ‘Yo! Help’ across our booking platforms. 

At OYO, technology is deeply embedded in our DNA. Over the past 6 years, we have built the world’s largest technology-driven hospitality chain. As we take a step towards normalcy and adapt to newer ways of living alongside the virus, we understand the significant role of digital and tech-based solutions to minimize human contact and maintain social distancing norms.

Typically, the hospitality industry is known as one of the most high-touch industries, relying mainly on human connections, be it the warm greetings at the reception, tikka on arrival, check-in, check-out formalities or room service among other instances. However, with COVID-19 spreading rapidly across the globe and social distancing becoming a way of life, the hospitality industry is at a pivotal point of transformation. The pandemic is ushering a ‘digital-shift’, which is an opportunity for OYO to rebuild differently and strengthen its focus on tech-enabled experiences. We are, therefore, focussing our efforts on enhancing processes and doing more with less. This is a once-in-a-lifetime situation that can leave us completely transformed.

With ‘Yo! Help’, we aim to own our consumers’ end-to-end experiences by enabling a self-help space. ‘Yo! Help’ is a 24*7 real-time chat assistant for OYO guests who have created a valid booking at any OYO hotels and homes across India.  With Yo! Help guests can seek answers to their queries during their journey with OYO from post-booking to post-checkout and cancellation phases.

We have invested significant time and effort into the product, continuously working towards fixing bugs and testing the software until it’s perfect. As a global hospitality chain, we have worked towards educating our bot with secure data, increasing its intelligence and empathy quotients. For instance, GST invoices does not make sense in countries other than India and hence the bot does not suggest those options in SEAME/USA. The bot is also enhanced to include personalization for guests coming in on OYO’s platforms as well as includes Natural Language Processing (NLP) to decrease the interaction time and bubble up relevant queries from the guests based on freely written text. 

Guests can reach the self-help tools with existing OYO app/booking, OTA booking and direct booking through the following steps:

• OYO’s self-help tools can be reached on the link www.oyorooms.com/assist 
• The guests will receive the link to OYO’s self-help tools in their booking confirmation SMS and via other channels. The AGMs/PMs can also share the link with the guests
• The guests can open the link on a mobile web browser or desktop and enter a valid booking ID and check-in date to authenticate their booking. (OTA guests can use the Booking ID provided by the OTAs like Booking.com, Agoda, MMT and GoIbibo)
• Once authenticated the guests can use Yo! Help get an automated answer through the bot or directly chat with an agent

Consumer feedback is of prime importance to us and we have used the feedback of our guests to understand what’s working best for them and the areas where we could improvise. With Yo! Help, we have been able to resolve queries across India within an Average Handling Time (ATH) of 01 minutes with as compared to a call centre’s ATH of 8-10 minutes. In terms of escalations, the average Turn Around Time (TAT) is 5-7 mins vs 2.5-3 hours (depending on the nature of the issue faced).  Some of the key USPs of our self-help tools are end to end automation and high-speed resolution which is completely built in-house with the ability to detect fraudulent cases. We shall continue to work on improving the chatbot to deliver an improved experience to our guests at all times. 

At OYO we believe in continuous improvisation as we aim to go the extra mile for our consumers who count on us for the differentiation in services. With Yo! Help, we are enhancing customer experiences and at the same time helping our business reduce costs without compromising on the customer service delivered to the end consumer.