JP7489511B2 - SERVICE SUPPORT DEVICE, SERVICE SUPPORT METHOD, AND PROGRAM - Google Patents

Description

This disclosure relates to a service support device, a service support method, and a program.

Conventionally, there is known a mechanism for having a customer support operator answer questions asked by a user about a service the user uses (for example, Patent Document 1).

JP 2016-82507 A

However, with conventional technology, there was an issue that it was difficult to smoothly answer users' questions when there were many questions or when the number of customer support operators was small.

The service support device that solves the above problem is characterized by comprising a reception unit that receives questions from service users, a customer support unit where a dedicated operator answers the questions, a community unit where members belonging to a community answer the questions, a determination unit that determines whether to allocate the questions to the customer support unit or the community unit depending on the status of the questions received by the reception unit, and an award unit that awards benefits depending on the answers from members belonging to the community.

With this configuration, the service support device can assign questions received from service users to members of the community, allowing the service user to receive answers more smoothly than if only customer support was available.

The service support device may further include a granting unit that grants a reward in response to an answer from a member belonging to the community.
According to this configuration, the granting unit can encourage community members to answer questions by using the fact that they will be given a reward as an incentive.

In the above service support device, the granting unit may grant the privilege to the member who provided an answer that resolves the question.
According to this configuration, the granting unit can encourage community members to answer questions by using the fact that they will be given a reward as an incentive.

In the above service support device, the granting unit may grant the benefit according to a degree of contribution to solving the question.
According to this configuration, the granting unit can encourage the community members to provide high-quality answers by using the fact that they will be given a reward as an incentive.

In the above service support device, the granting unit may grant the benefit according to the degree of contribution determined by the service user.
According to this configuration, the granting unit can encourage the community members to provide high-quality answers by using the fact that they will be given a reward as an incentive.

In the above service support device, the granting unit may determine the degree of contribution according to the content of the answer, and grant the benefit to the member according to the determined degree of contribution.
According to this configuration, the granting unit can encourage the community members to respond appropriately to the service user by using the fact that they will be given a special benefit as an incentive.

In the above-mentioned service support device, the decision unit may decide to assign the question to the community unit if the personal information of the service user is not used when answering the question.

According to this configuration, the determination unit assigns questions to community members only if the answer does not include information that should not be made public, such as the service user's personal information. This allows the determination unit to prevent the service user's personal information from being made known to others.

In the above service support device, the decision unit may decide to assign the question to the community unit when processing by the customer support unit is stagnating.
According to this configuration, the service support device basically provides the service user with a response from the customer support, thereby maintaining the quality of the response. In addition, when the process is stalled, the determination unit assigns the question to a member of the community, thereby enabling the service user to receive a smoother response than when only the customer support is available.

In the above service support device, the community unit may determine the member as the answerer for the question based on the member's track record of answering the question.
According to this configuration, the community unit can enable members of the community who have a proven track record as answerers of questions to provide answers to the service user.

The above-mentioned service support device may further include a determination unit that determines whether the question has been resolved by the member's response, and the community unit may accept the member's response if the determination unit determines that the question is unresolved after the member has responded while publishing the member's response to the community.

With this configuration, the community section can enable the service user to obtain answers until the question is resolved.
The above-mentioned service support device further includes a judgment unit which judges whether the question has been resolved by the member's answer, and the community unit may publish the member's answer to the community, and if the judgment unit judges that the question is unresolved after the member has answered, determine, based on instructions from the member who answered, that another member other than the member who has already answered the question as the answerer of the question.

With this configuration, the community section allows service users to obtain answers until their questions are resolved, while also allowing them to obtain answers from a wide range of members other than those of the community who have already responded.

In the above-mentioned service support device, the decision unit may decide to assign the question to the customer support department when the determination unit determines that the question is unresolved and the member has responded a predetermined number of times or more.

With this configuration, the decision unit can enable the service user to obtain a response from customer support if the response from the community members does not resolve the question.

In the above-mentioned service support device, the decision unit may acquire instructions from the service user and decide to assign the question to the customer support department based on the acquired instructions.

According to this configuration, the decision unit can enable the service user to obtain a response from customer support if the service user so desires.
The service support method for solving the above problem is characterized in that a computer receives a question from a service user and, depending on the status of the received question, determines whether to have the question answered by a dedicated operator or by a member belonging to a community.

The program for solving the above problem is characterized in that it causes a computer to accept questions from service users and, depending on the status of the accepted question, determine whether to have the question answered by a dedicated operator or by a member belonging to a community.
A service support device that solves the above problem comprises a reception unit that receives questions from service users, a customer support unit in which a dedicated operator answers the questions, a community unit in which members belonging to a community answer the questions, a determination unit that decides to allocate the question to the customer support unit or the community unit depending on the status of the question received by the reception unit, and a judgment unit that judges whether the question has been resolved by the member's answer based on the result input by the service user, and the determination unit decides to allocate the question to the customer support unit when the judgment unit determines that the question has not been resolved and the community unit has repeated the member's answer to the question a predetermined number of times or more.

According to this disclosure, answers can be provided to service users more smoothly than when only customer support is available.

FIG. 1 illustrates an example of a configuration of a service support system. FIG. 11 is a diagram showing an example of the contents of respondent information. FIG. 11 is a diagram showing an example of the content of question information. FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of the contents of history information. 5 is a flowchart showing an example of an operation of the service support device according to the first embodiment. FIG. 13 illustrates an example of a service screen. FIG. 13 is a diagram illustrating an example of a chat screen. FIG. 13 is a diagram illustrating an example of a chat screen. FIG. 13 is a diagram showing an example of an answer screen. FIG. 13 is a diagram illustrating an example of a chat screen. 10 is a flowchart showing an example of an operation of a service support device according to a second embodiment. 13 is a flowchart showing an example of an operation of the service support device according to the third embodiment. FIG. 13 is a diagram illustrating an example of a chat screen. FIG. 13 is a diagram illustrating an example of a chat screen.

Hereinafter, specific embodiments of a service support device, a service support method, and a program will be described with reference to the drawings.
First Embodiment
[overall structure]
As shown in Fig. 1, the service support system 1 of this embodiment includes a service support device 10 and one or more terminal devices 40. The devices included in the service support system 1 communicate with each other via a network NW. The network NW includes, for example, the Internet, a wide area network (WAN), a local area network (LAN), a provider terminal, a wireless communication network, a wireless base station, a dedicated line, and the like. Note that it is not necessary for all combinations of the devices shown in Fig. 1 to be able to communicate with each other, and the network NW may include a local network in part.

The service support device 10 is, for example, a device that is accessed by a terminal device 40 and provides information about the service via a service site. In the following, the service is assumed to be a communication service, and the service site provides information about the communication service. Here, the term "site" is assumed to include not only a website displayed by a browser, but also the original data of an app screen displayed by an application program. In the following explanation, a person who uses a communication service will be referred to as a "service user."

The terminal device 40 is any type of information processing device, including client devices such as smartphones, desktop PCs (Personal Computers), notebook PCs, and tablet PCs. A UA (User Agent) such as a browser or application is started on the terminal device 40. The UA displays a screen provided by the service support device 10, and transmits a request to the service support device 10 in response to an input operation performed by a user of the terminal device 40. The service support device 10 provides various information related to communication services in response to a request from the UA. The terminal device 40 is used, for example, by an operator who provides customer support to the service user, and by the service user.

[About community members]
Here, the service user includes a member of a community who answers questions about the communication service posed by the service user. The service user can join or leave the community if desired. The service support device 10 manages the members of the community.

[Configuration of service support device 10]
The service support device 10 includes, for example, a control unit 100, a storage unit 110, and a communication unit 120. The control unit 100 is realized by, for example, a hardware processor such as a CPU (Central Processing Unit) executing a program (software). In addition, some or all of these components may be realized by hardware (including circuitry) such as an LSI (Large Scale Integration), an ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuit), an FPGA (Field-Programmable Gate Array), or a GPU (Graphics Processing Unit), or may be realized by cooperation between software and hardware. The control unit 100 includes, for example, a reception unit 101, a customer support unit 102, a community unit 103, a determination unit 104, a judgment unit 105, and an assignment unit 106.

The storage unit 110 is realized by a non-transitory storage medium such as a RAM (Random Access Memory), HDD (Hard Disk Drive), flash memory, or ROM (Read Only Memory). In addition to the program that realizes the control unit 100, the storage unit 110 stores respondent information 111, question information 112, and history information 113. The respondent information 111 is information that the service support device 10 uses to manage the members of the community.

As shown in FIG. 2, the answerer information 111 includes one or more records in which, for example, a member ID capable of identifying a community member, information indicating the member's name, and information indicating the member's answering record are associated with each other. The member ID is, for example, given to each service user by the communication service provider when the community member starts using the communication service. The information indicating the member's answering record is, for example, information indicating the points held by the member, the rank given to the member, the number of times the member has answered questions, and the number of times questions have been solved by the member's answers. Points are, for example, given when a community member answers a question from a service user. Ranks are, for example, given according to the number of times the community member has answered questions from the service user, the quality of the answers, the service user's reputation, etc. Points and ranks are examples of "benefits" given to members.

As shown in FIG. 3, the question information 112 is information indicating a question of a service user. The question information 112 includes, for example, one or more records in which a question ID capable of identifying a question, a service user ID capable of identifying a service user, the date and time when the question was received from the service user, information indicating the content of the received question, information indicating an allocation destination of the question determined by the determination unit 104, and information indicating an answer flag are associated. The information indicating the allocation destination is, for example, information indicating the customer support unit 102 or information indicating the community unit 103. The answer flag is, for example, information indicating whether the corresponding question has been "answered" or "unanswered" by a member of the community or a dedicated operator who answers questions of service users. In the following description, the dedicated operator will be referred to as a "customer support operator".

As shown in FIG. 4, history information 113 is information indicating the history of questions posed by service users. History information 113 includes, for example, one or more records that associate a question ID, the member ID of the member who answered the question or the operator ID of the customer support operator who answered the question, information indicating the content of the service user's question, and information indicating the content of the answer.

Returning to FIG. 2, each unit of the control unit 100 will be described. The reception unit 101 receives a question about the communication service from the service user. For example, when a service screen related to the communication service provided by the service support device 10 is displayed on the terminal device 40, the service user performs an operation on the terminal device 40 to ask a question about the communication service. When an operation to ask a question is received on the terminal device 40, the reception unit 101 executes a process to receive the question from the service user.

The reception unit 101 generates a record that associates, for example, the date and time when the question was received, identification information that can identify the service user, and information indicating the received question, and generates a record of question information 112 to be stored in the memory unit 110.

The customer support unit 102 has a customer support operator answer the question received by the reception unit 101. The customer support operator is, for example, a person who has received a prescribed education and training in communication services and how to deal with service users. For example, when the reception unit 101 receives a question, the customer support unit 102 instructs the terminal device 40 used by the operator who can respond to the question to answer the question and has the operator answer. Also, when the reception unit 101 receives a question and there is no operator who can respond to the question, the customer support unit 102 instructs the terminal device 40 used by the operator to answer the question, starting with the question that was received first, as soon as an operator becomes available. For example, the customer support unit 102 provides a chat screen on which the service user who has asked the question and the operator can interact, to the terminal device 40 of the service user and the terminal device 40 of the operator, and has the operator answer the question.

In detail, the customer support department 102 extracts records that have information indicating the allocation destination set to "customer support" and an answer flag set to "unanswered" from among the records included in the question information 112. Then, the customer support department 102 has the operator answer the questions included in the extracted records in order of the earliest date and time the question was received.

The community unit 103 allows members belonging to the community to answer the questions received by the reception unit 101. For example, when the reception unit 101 receives a question, the community unit 103 discloses the question to a terminal device 40 used by a member who can respond to the question and allows the member to answer. For example, the community unit 103 provides a chat screen on which the service user who asked the question and the member can interact with each other to the service user's terminal device 40 and the member's terminal device 40, and allows the member to answer.

In detail, the community unit 103 extracts, for example, from the records included in the question information 112, records in which the information indicating the allocation destination is "community" and the answer flag is "unanswered." Then, for the questions included in the extracted records, the community unit 103 discloses the questions to the terminal devices 40 used by members who can answer the questions, and allows the members of the community to answer them.

The determination unit 104 determines whether to allocate the question to the customer support unit 102 or the community unit 103 depending on the status of the question received by the reception unit 101. Details of the process by which the determination unit 104 determines the allocation will be described later.

After the member has responded, the determination unit 105 determines whether the member's response has resolved the service user's question. For example, after the member has responded, the community unit 103 prompts the service user on a chat screen provided to perform an operation to request an answer as to whether the question has been resolved. The determination unit 105 determines whether the service user's question has been resolved by the member's response based on the operation on the screen provided by the community unit 103.

The granting unit 106 grants a reward to the member who answered the question as the answerer, depending on the answer from the member. Details of the process by which the granting unit 106 determines the reward to be granted to the member will be described later.

[Operation flow]
The operation of the service support device 10 will be described in detail below with reference to Fig. 5. First, the reception unit 101 determines whether or not a question from a service user that is input using the terminal device 40 of the questioner and received by the communication unit 120 via the network NW has been received (step S100). The process of receiving a question from a service user will be described in detail below with reference to Figs. 6 to 8. In addition, exchange of questions, answers, and the like between the terminal devices 40 of the questioner, members, and operators and the service support device 10 is carried out via the network NW and the communication unit 120.

As shown in FIG. 6, the service support device 10 provides the terminal device 40 with a service screen A1 showing information related to the communication service. The service screen A1 includes, for example, an icon GP1 that accepts questions about the communication service from the service user. The icon GP1 displays, for example, a message MS1 that prompts the service user to ask a question. The service user operates the icon GP1 displayed on the screen of the terminal device 40 by tapping or clicking to ask a question about the communication service. For example, when the icon GP1 is operated on the terminal device 40, the service support device 10 provides a chat screen B1 to the terminal device 40 that operated the icon GP1 and obtains details of the question.

As shown in Figures 7 and 8, chat screen B1 includes, for example, replies to the service user and questions from the service user. In this embodiment, on chat screen B1, the answer display RGP is displayed as the answerer's speech, and the question display QGP is displayed as the speech of the service user who asked the question.

First, as shown in FIG. 7, the chat screen B1 includes an answer display RGP1 showing a message MS2 that prompts the service user to select a question from a selection of multiple questions. The chat screen B1 also includes an icon GP2 that allows the service user to select a type of question. The icon GP2 includes, for example, a message MS3 that prompts the user to select a type of question (hereinafter, question type QT) and an image showing three question types QT1 to QT3. The question type QT1 is, for example, a "question about a fee plan" for a communication service, the question type QT2 is, for example, a "question about an area in which the communication service can be used," and the question type QT3 is, for example, a "question about changing the subscriber information." Of the question types QT1 to QT3, the question type QT3 is a question type that requires personal information of the service user who asked the question when answering the question. Note that the number and contents of the question types QT included in the icon GP2 are merely examples and are not limited to these. The service user selects the question type QT for his/her question by selecting one of the question types QT1 to QT3 from the icon GP2 displayed on the screen of the terminal device 40.

When icon GP2 is operated on the terminal device 40, for example, the service support device 10 provides the terminal device 40 of the service user who asked the question with a chat screen B1 that further includes an answer display RGP2. The answer display RGP2 displays a message MS4 that prompts the service user to input the content of the question. When the answer display RGP2 is displayed, the service user inputs the content of the question into the input section of the terminal device 40. When the reception section 101 acquires information indicating the content of the service user's question from the terminal device 40, it determines that the question has been received.

As shown in FIG. 8, the service support device 10 provides, on the chat screen B1, a question display QGP1 indicating the question content QTC received from the service user, and an answer display RGP3 including a message MS5 prompting the service user to wait until the question is answered.

Next, the determination unit 104 determines whether to allocate the question to the customer support unit 102 or the community unit 103 depending on the status of the question accepted by the acceptance unit 101 (step S102). In detail, for example, when the service user's question type QT uses personal information of the service user who asked the question when answering the question, the determination unit 104 allocates the question to the customer support unit 102. In this case, the determination unit 104 allocates questions of the service user's question types QT1 to QT2 to the community unit 103, and allocates questions of the service user's question type QT3 to the customer support unit 102. The determination unit 104 updates the question information 112 by including information indicating the determined allocation destination in the record.

When a question is assigned by the determination unit 104, the community unit 103 provides an answer screen C1 to the terminal device 40 of the community member in order to solicit members who wish to answer the question (step S104). For example, the community unit 103 refers to the question information 112 and provides the answer screen C1 for a question that is assigned to the "community."

As shown in FIG. 9, the answer screen C1 includes the question content QTC and one or more question information images IQF indicating the answerer's decision status. In the example shown in FIG. 9, two question information images IQF, question information images IQF1 and IQF2, are included. The name of the questioner and an image representing the questioner are registered by the service user when signing up for the communication service or when asking a question about the communication service.

The answer screen C1 also includes an operation button BT1 for performing an operation to answer the question indicated by the question information image IQF. The community unit 103 provides the answer screen C1 to members of the community. The community members use the terminal device 40 to refer to the answer screen C1 and check the question content QTC of the service user. When a community member wishes to answer a question for which an answerer has not yet been determined, the community member activates the question information image IQF to which the answer is desired by selecting it, and selects the operation button BT1. In response to the operation button BT1 being operated, the terminal device 40 transmits information indicating the question selected by the community member and the member ID of the community member to the service support device 10.

The community unit 103 determines a respondent from among the members who have received a request for a response within a specified time (step S106). The community unit 103 determines a member who will respond to the question from among the members who wish to respond, for example, based on the track record of the community members in responding to questions. The community unit 103 searches the respondent information 111 using, for example, the member ID acquired from the terminal device 40 of the member who wishes to respond as a search key, and identifies the record of that member. If the answering track record included in the identified record meets a specified criterion, the community unit 103 determines that member as the respondent to the question.

The specified criteria are, for example, having a specified number of points or more, being of a specified rank or more, answering a specified number of times or more, solving a specified number of times or more, etc. The community unit 103 determines a member who satisfies some or all of the specified criteria as the person who will answer the question. For example, when there are multiple members who wish to answer, the community unit 103 determines the member with the best answering record as the person who will answer the question. For example, the community unit 103 determines a member who satisfies at least one or all of the following among the multiple members: highest points, highest rank, most answers, and most solutions, as the person who will answer the question.

The community unit 103 provides a chat screen B1 to the terminal device 40 of the member determined as the answerer, and waits for a response from the terminal device 40 (step S108). The answerer checks the question content QTC included in the chat screen B1 provided to the terminal device 40, and inputs the response content into the input section of the terminal device 40. Then, when the community unit 103 determines that the response from the answerer member has been accepted, it provides the answer from the answerer member to the service user who asked the question (step S110).

As shown in FIG. 10, the community unit 103 adds an answer display RGP4, which shows the answer content RPC of the answerer, to the chat screen B1 and provides it to the terminal device 40 of the service user who asked the question and the terminal device 40 of the member who is the answerer.

The community unit 103 makes the answer of the member who is the answerer public to the other members of the community (step S112). For example, if another member of the community selects a question information image IQF that includes information indicating that an answerer has already been determined, the community unit 103 provides a chat screen B1 related to the question to the terminal device 40 of the other member. In addition, the community unit 103 generates a record that associates information indicating the content of the member's answer acquired via the chat screen B1, a question ID that can identify the question, and the member ID of the member determined as the answerer, and updates the history information 113.

When the answering is completed, the determining unit 105 determines whether the answer received by the community unit 103 has solved the question of the service user (step S114).
10, when the community unit 103 determines that the answer is complete, it further includes a confirmation display GP3 in the chat screen B1 and provides it to the terminal device 40 of the service user who asked the question. The community unit 103 determines that the answer is complete, for example, when no additional answer or additional question is received within a predetermined time period after the answer is received from the answerer.

The confirmation display GP3 includes, for example, a message MS6 that prompts the service user to select whether or not the question has been resolved, an operation button BT2 for selecting that the question has been resolved, and an operation button BT3 for selecting that the question has not been resolved. The service user who asked the question refers to the chat screen B1, and operates the operation button BT2 or the operation button BT3 based on the results of checking the answer content RPC. The terminal device 40 transmits information indicating whether or not the question has been resolved to 10 in response to the operation of the service user who asked the question. The determination unit 105 determines whether or not the service user's question has been resolved based on the information acquired from the terminal device 40.

If the determination unit 105 determines that the question has not been resolved, the community unit 103 updates the question information 112 by setting the answer flag of the record of the question information 112 related to the question to "unanswered", and returns to step S104. The community unit 103 then provides the community members with an answer screen C1 in which the question information image IQF indicating the question content QTC has been updated to information indicating that the answerer has not been determined.

Here, the member who provided an answer as a respondent in step S110 may refer to the updated answer screen C1 and wish to answer a question that he or she has already answered. This allows even a member who has already provided an answer as a respondent to answer the same question again.

When the determination unit 105 determines that the question has been resolved, the granting unit 106 grants a reward to the member who answered the question as a respondent, depending on the answer from the member (step S116). As a reward, the granting unit 106 grants either or both of points or a rank higher than the current rank. The granting unit 106 grants a predetermined reward to the member who answered the question as a respondent.

The granting unit 106 refers to the history information and identifies the member ID of the member who answered as the answerer. The granting unit 106 searches the answerer information 111 using the identified member ID as a search key and identifies the record of the member to whom the privilege will be granted. The granting unit 106 updates the identified record based on the privilege that has been decided to be granted, or stores the generated answerer information 111 in the storage unit 110. In this way, the granting unit 106 grants the privilege to the member.

When a question is assigned by the determination unit 104, the customer support unit 102 determines whether or not an operator is available to respond to the question (step S118). If there is no operator available to respond to the question, the customer support unit 102 waits until an operator becomes available. If there is an operator available to respond to the question, or if an operator becomes available to respond to the question, the customer support unit 102 instructs the operator to answer the received question in the order in which the questions were received by the reception unit 101 (step S120).

The customer support unit 102 extracts, for example, records included in the question information 112, whose allocation destination information is "customer support" and whose answer flag is "unanswered". The customer support unit 102 discloses the question included in the extracted record to the terminal device 40 of the operator determined as the answerer, and has the customer support operator answer the question. The customer support unit 102 provides, for example, a chat screen B1 to the terminal device 40 used by the operator determined as the answerer. The customer support unit 102 acquires information indicating the answer content RPC from the terminal device 40 of the operator who is the answerer. The customer support unit 102 provides the answer of the operator who is the answerer to the service user who asked the question (step S122). For example, the customer support unit 102 further includes an answer display RGP indicating the answer content RPC of the answerer in the chat screen B1, and provides it to the terminal device 40 of the service user who asked the question and the terminal device 40 of the operator of the answerer. In addition, the customer support unit 102 generates a record that associates information indicating the content of the operator's response obtained via the chat screen B1, a question ID that can identify the question, and the operator ID of the operator who responded, and updates the history information 113.

[Effects of the service support device 10 of this embodiment]
(1-1) In the service support device 10 of this embodiment, the determination unit 104 determines whether to allocate a question to the customer support unit 102 or the community unit 103, depending on the status of the question received by the reception unit 101. The granting unit 106 grants a reward in accordance with the answer from a member belonging to the community.

Here, when there are many questions from service users or when the number of customer support operators is small, it is difficult to smoothly answer the user's questions. On the other hand, the service support device 10 can provide answers to service users more smoothly by assigning questions received from service users to members of the community, compared to when only customer support is available.

(1-2) In this embodiment, the determination unit 104 may determine to assign a question to the community unit 103 if the service user's personal information is not used in answering the question. According to this configuration, the determination unit 104 assigns a question to a member of the community only if the answer does not use information that should not be made public, such as the service user's personal information. In this way, the determination unit 104 can prevent the service user's personal information from being made known to others.

(1-3) In this embodiment, the community unit 103 may determine a member as a respondent to a question based on the member's track record in answering questions. With this configuration, the service support device 10 can enable a community member with a track record in answering questions to provide an answer to a service user.

(1-4) In this embodiment, the determination unit 105 determines whether the question has been resolved by the member's response. The community unit 103 publishes the chat screen B1 including the member's response to the community, and accepts the member's response if the determination unit 105 determines that the question is unresolved after the member has responded. With this configuration, the community unit 103 can enable the service user to obtain responses until the question is resolved.

(1-5) In this embodiment, the granting unit 106 may grant a reward to a member who provides an answer that resolves a question. With this configuration, the granting unit 106 can encourage community members to answer questions by using the reward as an incentive.

Second Embodiment
Hereinafter, a second embodiment of the present disclosure will be described with reference to the drawings. In the first embodiment, a case has been described in which the community unit 103 accepts replies from members of the community until the question is resolved. In the second embodiment, a case will be described in which the determination unit 104 assigns a question to the customer support unit 102 when replies from members of the community are made a predetermined number of times or more. Note that the same reference numerals will be used to designate the same components as those in the above-described embodiment, and description thereof will be omitted.

[Operation flow]
Among the various processes shown in Fig. 11, the same processes as those in Fig. 5 are denoted by the same reference numerals. As shown in Fig. 11, in the service support device 10 of the present embodiment, when the determination unit 105 determines in step S114 that the question has not been resolved, the service support device 10 performs the process of step S200.

The determination unit 104 determines whether or not to assign a question that is determined by the determination unit 105 to be unresolved to the customer support unit 102 (step S200). In this embodiment, the determination unit 104 determines whether the question has been answered by members of the community a predetermined number of times or more, and if it is determined that the question has been answered a predetermined number of times or more, decides to assign the question to the customer support unit 102.

The determination unit 104 searches the history information 113 using, for example, the question ID of the question as a search key. If the record includes a predetermined number of records to which the question ID is associated and whose answerer ID is a member ID, the determination unit 104 determines that the community members have answered the question a predetermined number of times or more. If the determination unit 104 determines that the community members have not answered the question a predetermined number of times or more, the process returns to step S104. Accordingly, the community unit 103 continues to accept answers to the question from the community members. If the determination unit 104 determines that the question has been answered a predetermined number of times or more, the determination unit 104 decides to assign (transfer) the question to the customer support unit 102 and returns to step S118. Accordingly, the customer support unit 102 executes the subsequent processes assuming that the question was accepted at the time when the question was assigned to the customer support unit 102 in step S200.

According to the above embodiment, in addition to the above advantages (1-1) to (1-8), the following advantages can be obtained.
(2-1) In this embodiment, when the judgment unit 105 judges that a question is unresolved and a member has provided an answer a predetermined number of times or more, the decision unit 104 decides to assign the question to the customer support unit 102. According to this configuration, when the answer from the member of the community does not resolve the question, the decision unit 104 can enable the service user to obtain an answer from a customer support operator.

Third Embodiment
Hereinafter, a third embodiment of the present disclosure will be described with reference to the drawings. In the above-described embodiment, a case where a member of a community may wish to answer a question that has already been answered has been described. In the third embodiment, a case where the community unit 103 determines a member other than the member who has already answered the question as the answerer of the question will be described. Note that the same reference numerals are used for configurations similar to those of the above-described embodiment, and descriptions thereof will be omitted.

[Operation flow]
Among the various processes shown in Fig. 12, the same processes as those in Fig. 5 are denoted by the same reference numerals. As shown in Fig. 12, in the service support device 10 of the present embodiment, when the determination unit 105 determines in step S114 that the question has not been resolved, the service support device 10 performs the process of step S300.

When the determination unit 105 determines that the question has not been resolved, the community unit 103 excludes members of the community who have already answered the question from those who can answer the question (step S300). For example, in the process of the following step S104, when the community unit 103 provides the answer screen C1 to the members of the community, the answer screen C1 does not include the question information image IQF related to the question for the members of the community who have already answered. In this case, the members of the community who have already answered cannot confirm the question information image IQF related to the question to which they have answered on the answer screen C1, and are excluded from those who can answer the question. As a result, in the process of the following step S106, the community unit 103 will no longer accept requests for answers from members of the community who have already answered, and will determine another member other than the members who have already answered as the answerer.

When the determination unit 105 determines that the question has not been resolved and information indicating an instruction to stop answering the question has been received from a member of the community who has already answered the question, the community unit 103 excludes the member of the community who has already answered the question from those who can answer the question (step S300).

According to the above embodiment, in addition to the above advantages (1-1) to (1-8), the following advantages can be obtained.
(3-1) In this embodiment, when the determination unit 105 determines that the question is unresolved after a member has answered the question, the community unit 103 determines another member other than the member who has already answered the question as the answerer of the question. Here, a member who has already answered the question but has not been able to solve the question may not be able to solve the question. With this configuration, the community unit 103 can enable a service user to obtain answers from members of other communities by excluding members who are unable to answer the question.

The above embodiment may be modified as follows: The above embodiment and each of the following modifications may be combined with each other within a range where no technical contradiction occurs.
Instead of the process of providing the chat screen B1, the customer support unit 102 may provide a bulletin board screen. In this case, a question input screen is provided to a service user who asks a question instead of the chat screen B1. The service user provides a question using the question input screen. When a question is assigned by the determination unit 104, the community unit 103 provides an answer screen C1 including the question content QTC acquired using the question input screen to the terminal device 40 of the community member.

The community unit 103 provides an answer input screen to the terminal device 40 of the community member determined as the answerer. The answerer of the community provides an answer using the answer input screen. Instead of the chat screen B1, the community unit 103 provides a bulletin board screen including the question content QTC obtained using the question input screen and the answer content RPC obtained using the answer input screen to the service user who asked the question, while also making it available to other community members.

According to this configuration, the community unit 103 can provide a bulletin board screen, allowing the service user and the community members acting as respondents to communicate in a bulletin board format. Note that the community unit 103 may determine whether to provide the chat screen B1 or the bulletin board screen, in response to an instruction from the service user or the community members acting as respondents.

○ If there is only one member who wishes to respond and that member does not meet the specified criteria, the community unit 103 may not need to determine an answerer until another member who meets the specified criteria wishes to respond.

The community unit 103 may determine a respondent from among the members of the community, regardless of the wishes of the members. In this case, the community unit 103 may, for example, refer to history information, identify a member of the community who has a history of answering a similar question, and determine the identified member as the respondent. In this case, the community unit 103 may not need to provide the answer screen C1 to the members of the community.

The community unit 103 may determine, as the answerer, a member who wishes to receive an answer to a question earliest among the members who wish to receive an answer to the question.
In step S300, the community unit 103 may automatically exclude from the list of respondents those members of the community who have already responded, or may exclude those members from the list of respondents based on an instruction from the members who have responded.

As shown in FIG. 13, in this embodiment, the community unit 103 provides a chat screen B1-1 to the terminal device 40 of the answering member. The chat screen B1-1 includes an icon GP4. The icon GP4 includes, for example, a message MS8 that asks the answering member whether or not to stop answering questions. When the answering member wants to stop answering questions, he or she operates the icon GP4. In response to the operation of the answering member, the terminal device 40 transmits information to the service support device 10 indicating an instruction from the answering member to stop answering questions.

According to this configuration, when the determination unit 105 determines that the question is unresolved after a member has answered, the community unit 103 determines, based on instructions from the member who answered, that another member other than the member who has already answered the question will be the answerer of the question. Here, even if a community member wishes to answer a question, there are cases in which they are unable to answer the question themselves when they actually respond to the question. According to this configuration, the community unit 103 can enable service users to obtain answers from members of other communities by excluding members who have been instructed to stop answering questions.

The community unit 103 may disclose the ranks and points of community members to itself and others. In this case, the community unit 103 may provide a site that discloses the ranks and points of community members to others based on the respondent information 111, and may include an image showing the ranks and points of the respondent members on the chat screen B1, bulletin board screen, etc. The community unit 103 may also vary the display mode of the answer display RGP and answer information image IRF depending on the ranks and points of the respondent members. For example, the community unit 103 may display the answer display RGP and answer information image IRF of members with a high rank or many points in a manner that makes them more noticeable than members with a low rank or few points.

○ For example, when the processing of the customer support unit 102 is stalled, the determination unit 104 may determine to allocate the question to the community unit 103. In this case, the determination unit 104 updates the record of the question information 112, for example, by further including information indicating the timing at which the allocation destination was determined. The determination unit 104 refers to the question information 112 at a predetermined time interval and extracts records whose answer flag is "unanswered" and whose allocation destination is "customer support". When the number of records (questions) among the extracted records for which the time elapsed from the timing at which the allocation destination was determined is equal to or greater than a predetermined time is equal to or greater than a certain number, the determination unit 104 determines that the processing of the customer support unit 102 is stalled. Furthermore, when the time elapsed from the timing at which the allocation destination was determined for the extracted records is equal to or greater than the stall determination time, the determination unit 104 determines that the processing of the customer support unit 102 is stalled.

As described above, customer support operators have received a certain education and training in communication services and how to deal with service users. According to this configuration, the decision unit 104 basically decides to provide the service user with a customer support response, thereby maintaining the quality of the response at a certain level. Furthermore, when the processing of the customer support unit 102 is stalled, the decision unit 104 can provide a smoother response to the service user than when only the customer support is responding by allocating the question to a member of the community. Furthermore, when a response using personal information is clearly expected, the decision unit 104 allocates the question to the customer support unit 102, and when a response not using personal information is expected, the decision unit 104 allocates the question to the community unit 103 only during stalls. As a result, the service support device 10 can provide a smooth response by using the community while ensuring a certain degree of probability that the user will receive a high-quality additional response using personal information even if it is expected that personal information will not be used based on the question type.

In step S200, if the service user who asked the question instructs customer support to provide an answer, the decision unit 104 may decide to assign (hand over) the question to the customer support unit 102.

As shown in FIG. 14, the community unit 103 provides the chat screen B1-2 to the terminal device 40 of the service user who asked the question. The chat screen B1-2 includes an icon GP5. The icon GP5 includes, for example, a message MS8 that prompts the service user to select whether or not to instruct customer support to request a response, an operation button BT4 for selecting to instruct customer support to request a response, and an operation button BT5 for selecting not to instruct customer support to request a response. For example, when an operation is performed on the operation button BT3 in the confirmation display GP3 to select that the problem has not been resolved, the community unit 103 provides the service user with the chat screen B1-2 including the icon GP5.

The service user who has asked the question operates operation button BT6 if they wish to instruct customer support to request a response, and operates operation button BT5 if they do not wish to instruct customer support to request a response. Depending on the service user's operation, the terminal device 40 transmits information to the service support device 10 indicating whether or not to instruct customer support to request a response.

When the determination unit 104 determines that the information acquired from the terminal device 40 of the service user who asked the question indicates that an instruction to request a response from customer support is to be issued (step S200), the determination unit 104 updates the allocation destination of the record of the question information 112 related to the question to "customer support" and returns to step S118. On the other hand, when the determination unit 104 determines that the information acquired from the terminal device 40 of the service user who asked the question indicates that an instruction to request a response from customer support is not to be issued (step S200), the determination unit 104 returns to step S104.

According to this configuration, the decision unit 104 acquires an instruction from the service user and decides to assign a question to the customer support unit 102 based on the acquired instruction. If the service user so desires, the decision unit 104 can enable the service user to obtain a response from customer support.

○ The determination unit 104 may determine to assign (transfer) a question from the community unit 103 to the customer support unit 102, other than when a response is given a predetermined number of times or when the service user performs an operation to select an instruction to request a response from the customer support. For example, when the processing of the community unit 103 is stalled, the determination unit 104 may determine to assign a question to the customer support unit 102. The process by which the determination unit 104 determines that the processing of the community unit 103 is stalled is the same as when the above-mentioned method of determining that the processing of the customer support unit 102 is stalled is applied to the community unit 103, so an explanation is omitted. In addition, the determination unit 104 may determine to assign a question to the customer support unit 102 when a customer support operator who is highly skilled in answering questions checks the answer content RPC or the answer screen C1 and determines that the quality of the answer is low or that the service user is dissatisfied with the response. The determination unit 104 may also perform morphological analysis or the like on the question content QTC to identify the dissatisfaction level of the service user, and determine to assign the question to the customer support unit 102 according to the identified dissatisfaction level.

When there are multiple members who have answered the question as answerers, the granting unit 106 may grant a predetermined bonus to each of the multiple members uniformly, or may grant different bonuses to each of the multiple members. The granting unit 106 may grant a bonus to a member who has answered the question as an answerer and whose answer resolves the question. In this case, the granting unit 106 grants a bonus to the member who last answered at the time when the determination unit 105 determines that the problem has been resolved, as the member who provided the answer that resolved the question. The granting unit 106 may grant a bonus only to that member, or may grant a bonus to at least that member.

The granting unit 106 may grant a reward according to the degree of contribution to solving the question. The degree of contribution may be determined, for example, by the service user who asked the question. In this case, the granting unit 106 grants more rewards to members who provide answer content RPCs with a high degree of contribution based on the decision of the service user, compared to members who provide answer content RPCs with a low degree of contribution. The degree of contribution may also be determined, for example, according to the answer content RPC. In this case, the degree of contribution may be determined by a customer support operator who is highly skilled in answering questions, by checking the answer content RPC, or may be determined using a learning model that learns the answer content RPC, information indicating whether the question has been solved, and the degree of contribution as teacher data. According to this configuration, the granting unit 106 can encourage the community members to provide a high-quality answer by using the granting of the reward as a motivation. According to this configuration, the granting unit 106 can encourage the community members to provide an appropriate response to the service user by using the granting of the reward as a motivation.

The information indicating answering performance included in the respondent information 111 is an example and is not limited to this. The respondent information 111 may include some or all of the points held by the member, the rank given to the member, the number of times the member has answered questions, and the number of times questions have been resolved by the member's answers. Furthermore, the respondent information 111 may include information indicating answering performance other than the examples described above.

The granting unit 106 may grant a reward to the member who answered the question, regardless of the judgment result of the judgment unit 105. In this case, the granting unit 106 grants a predetermined reward to the member who answered the question in response to the member providing the answer.

The granting unit 106 may grant a uniform reward for each question. When there are multiple members who have answered a question as respondents, the granting unit 106 distributes the uniform reward for the question to the multiple members. For example, the granting unit 106 may distribute the reward equally to the multiple members, or may distribute the reward with differences based on the degree of contribution, etc. According to this configuration, the granting unit 106 can encourage community members to provide high-quality answers by using the reward as an incentive.

When the question is assigned to the customer support unit 102 in step S200, the customer support unit 102 may execute the subsequent processes assuming that the question was accepted at the time when the acceptance unit 101 accepted the question. This makes it possible to obtain an answer from the service user who asked the question earliest.

○ Although the above description concerns a case where the service is a communication service, this is not limited to this. The service may be any service as long as the service user has a question about the service and the question is answered by customer support.

Although the above describes a case where a service user can join or leave a community if they wish, this is not limited to the case. A service user may be able to join a community if they have received prescribed education and training regarding communication services and service user response. A service user may also be able to join a community if they have passed a prescribed test regarding communication services and service user response. A service user may also be able to leave a community if they have received permission from the provider providing the communication services or customer support.

The points may be used to pay for communication services or other services affiliated with the communication services. In this case, the service support device 10 updates the respondent information 111 according to the point usage by the members of the community. The granting unit 106 may grant achievement points that continue to increase according to the achievement of the answer, in addition to the points that can be used for payment. In this case, the granting unit 106 may grant a rank according to the number of achievement points granted to the members of the community.

The service support device 10 does not need to award points to members of the community. In this case, the control unit 100 of the service support device 10 does not need to include the awarding unit 106.

1...service support system, 10...service support device, 40...terminal device, 100...control unit, 101...reception unit, 102...customer support unit, 103...community unit, 104...determination unit, 105...judgment unit, 106...assignment unit, 110...storage unit, 111...answerer information, 120...communication unit, A1...service screen, B1...chat screen, C1...answer screen, IQF, IQF1, IQF2...question information image, IRF...answer information image, QGP, QGP1...question display, QT, QT1, QT2, QT3...question type, QTC...question content, RGP, RGP1, RGP2, RGP3, RGP4...answer display, RPC...answer content.

Claims (14)

a reception unit for receiving questions from service users;
a customer support department where dedicated operators answer the questions;
a community section in which members belonging to the community answer the questions;
a determination unit that determines whether to allocate the question to the customer support unit or the community unit according to a status of the question accepted by the acceptance unit;
a determination unit that determines whether the question has been resolved by the answer of the member based on the result input by the service user,
The service support device is characterized in that the decision unit decides to assign the question to the customer support unit when the judgment unit determines that the question has not been resolved and the community unit has repeated the process of having the members answer the question a predetermined number of times or more. a reward unit that rewards rewards in accordance with answers from members of the community;
The service support device according to claim 1 . The granting unit grants the privilege to the member who provided an answer that resolves the question.
The service support device according to claim 2. The granting unit grants the privilege according to a degree of contribution to solving the question.
4. The service support device according to claim 2 or 3. The granting unit grants the benefit according to the degree of contribution determined by the service user.
5. The service support device according to claim 4. The granting unit determines the degree of contribution according to the content of the answer, and grants the privilege according to the determined degree of contribution.
6. The service support device according to claim 4 or 5. When the personal information of the service user is not used in answering the question, the determination unit determines to assign the question to the community unit.
The service support device according to any one of claims 1 to 6. the determining unit determines to assign the question to the community unit when the processing of the customer support unit is stalled;
The service support device according to any one of claims 1 to 7. the community unit determines the member as a respondent to the question based on the member's track record of answering the question;
A service support device according to any one of claims 1 to 8. the community unit publishes the answers by the members to the community, and when the determination unit determines that the question is unresolved after the answers by the members are provided, accepts the answers by the members.
The service support device according to any one of claims 1 to 9. the community unit publishes the answers of the members to the community, and when the determination unit determines that the question is unresolved after the members have answered, determines a member other than the member who has already answered as a reply to the question based on an instruction from the member who answered;
The service support device according to any one of claims 1 to 9. The determination unit acquires an instruction from the service user, and determines to assign the question to the customer support unit based on the acquired instruction.
A service support device according to any one of claims 1 to 11. The computer
A reception process for receiving questions from service users;
a determination process for determining whether to allocate the question to a customer support section where a dedicated operator answers the question, or to a community section where members belonging to a community answer the question, depending on the status of the received question;
a determination process for determining whether or not the question has been resolved by the answer of the member based on the result input by the service user;
The service support method is characterized in that, in the decision process, if the judgment process determines that the question has not been resolved and the member has repeatedly responded to the question a predetermined number of times or more, it is decided to assign the question to the customer support department. On the computer,
A reception process for receiving questions from a service user;
a determination process for determining whether the question should be assigned to a customer support section where a dedicated operator answers the question, or to a community section where members belonging to a community answer the question, depending on the status of the received question;
a determination process for determining whether or not the question has been resolved by the answer of the member based on the result input by the service user;
The program is characterized in that, in the decision process, if the judgment process determines that the question has not been resolved and the member has repeatedly responded to the question a predetermined number of times, it is decided to assign the question to the customer support department.

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