AI Call Agents vs. Human Agents: When to Use Which

As a call-reliant business, you’d like to process calls in bulk while not overloading your sales reps and not sacrificing the quality of service, and you can do that with AI call agents built into your conversational AI call processing system. Phonexa’s AI call agents can become a great asset to your company, empowering your call center with unprecedented speed and accuracy.

But you also have to recognize their limits. As great a complementary tool as autonomous AI Call Agents are – even if they are the centerpiece of your call processing system – you must know where a live operator should step in to handle things only a human expert can handle.

As much as I’m thrilled about Phonexa’s AI call agents – no doubt they are a great asset to anyone receiving business calls – I want to be fair and impartial. So I suggest we have a fair conversation about when to use AI call agents and when you might overcommit.

First, though, let’s quickly run through the basics.

“Phonexa is end-to-end software built for performance marketing and affiliate marketing teams that are driving a high volume of consumer traffic. We help them track their affiliate marketing and performance marketing efforts in one place, allowing them to see their affiliate traffic alongside the different ways that their consumers are actually reaching out to them. This includes leads, calls, transactions, traffic from affiliates, and other inbound marketing sources.” – Oliver Koukoulis-Fribbens, Chief Sales Officer at Phonexa

Want to upgrade your call center to generate and convert more calls? Book a demo to see how Phonexa’s call center AI software can grow your business.

What Are AI Call Agents?

An AI Voice or Call Agent is a self-operating software, programmed to support a specific conversation flow based on the pre-set parameters and the real-time data collected during the conversation.

➥ Phonexa’s AI Call Agents can process conversations in real time while factoring in multiple call criteria to pave the optimal journey for a specific caller. In practice, AI collects as much of the caller’s info as possible while asking a minimum number of questions and not repeating the questions asked before. Then, the caller is routed to a matching rep.

With unlimited processing capacity, continuous self-improvement, around-the-clock availability, and unmatched accuracy, AI Call Agents are superior to human agents in several dimensions. 

Types of AI Call Agents

Rule-Based AI Call Agents

Strictly speaking, AI Call Agents that follow the call script aren’t AI, but the term is still loosely applied to such systems. Rule-based AI Call Agents can handle simpler queries, but they cannot learn from interactions.An example of rule-based call agents is a basic call menu: push 1 to verify your balance; push 2 if you want to switch your subscription plan; push 3 to connect to a live operator.

Conversational AI Call Agents

Conversational AI Call Agents contextualize responses depending on the information collected during the call to pave the optimal conversion path for the caller.

Here’s what AI Call Agents can do, depending on their type:

• Recognize and interpret the caller’s speech
• Communicate in multiple languages without delays
• Provide contextualized responses and routing, including historical context
• Handle queries independently of live operators
• Qualify, nurture, and score leads

Modern conversational AI systems like the one used in Phonexa’s Call Logic combine several, if not all, of the mentioned features. For example, Phonexa’s AI Call Agents, on the one hand, follow the pre-designed communication infrastructure while also being able to contextualize their responses and actions in real time based on the data collected throughout the conversation.

When Are Human Operators Better Than AI Call Agents?

The more complex the conversation, the greater advantage the live operator has over an AI agent, even though the latter can analyze and interpret human speech. However, I’d like to address more factors than conversation complexity.

Here are the ten most popular use cases of AI at call centers:

Source: Statista

Now, analyze some of these use cases:

	AI Call Agent Advantages	Live Operator Advantages
Voice Authentication	Instant identity verification if the speech is clear	Recognizing distorted voices, background noises, speech impairments, and fraud attempts
Call Automation	Pre-designed and contextualized call routing at a general level	Processing complex and unique calls that require case-by-case judgment and exceptions to the rules
Speech Analytics	Analyzing large volumes of calls for marketing patterns, compliance, and intent at a basic level	Discerning between shares of meaning and degree of intent, including understanding humor, sarcasm, colloquialisms, and cultural nuances
Transcription	Near-instant, cost-efficient transcription	Understanding noisy conversations, multiple concurrent speakers, jargon, etc.
Sentiment Analytics	Analyzing large-scale sentiment trends and how the caller behaves against them	Understanding nuanced contexts and the cultural and psychological background of the caller by the caller’s location, age, status, etc.

When it comes to emotional intelligence, complex problem-solving, cultural and linguistic backgrounds, and situations that require individual judgment, AI Call Agents are generally inferior to live operators. And it’s not just me rooting for humans – the world’s biggest companies agree.

Here are the real-world examples where companies prefer human operators over AI:

JP Morgan – Voice Authentication	AI voice agents can authenticate voice automatically, but anomalies like suspicious behavior or voice mismatch, as well as high-value transactions, are handled by human operators.
Emirates – Complex Travel Problems	AI handles routine requests like booking flights, refunds, etc., while operators handle emergency cases like, for example, complex flight re-routing across airlines.
Mayo Clinic – Speech Analytics	AI Call Agents can schedule appointments, while nurses, doctors, and support staff can accurately determine the urgency of each case based on the speech tone, hesitation, and other nuances.
State Farm – Image Recognition	AI may not always accurately assess car accident damage from photos, so there’s a potential for illegitimate or downright fraudulent claims (for example, using AI-generated images).
Amazon – Language Translation	Slang, jargon, and dialects may sometimes be misunderstood by AI, especially in complex languages like Chinese, which is why human translations handle high-value cases.
Ritz-Carlton – Emotional Recognition	AI can handle hotel reservations, but sometimes, having a real person on the phone is necessary. For example, when a guest is upset, the apology call should be made by the hotel staff, not the robot.

The trend is clear: AI Call Agents are getting stronger, but it’s still debatable whether they will ever get strong enough to replace human agents completely. On the other hand, a synergy of the two is usually far superior to a human agent processing a call without any help from AI.

Build your plan now, or book a demo to learn how to synergize Phonexa’s call center AI solutions and live operators.

When Are AI Call Agents Better than Live Operators?

It’s incredible how AI Call Agents resonate with major customer experience priorities.

Here are the four top customer service priorities, according to customer service leaders:

• Increasing customer satisfaction
• Improve self-service channels
• Increasing the automation rate
• Reducing customer service response times

The best AI Call Agents can do all of that, recognizing the caller’s intent, keeping the conversation efficient, and ultimately driving the caller to a conversion or the best-matching live operator.

Source: Statista

Here are the domains where AI Call Agents consistently outperform live operators:

• Response and request resolution speed
• Managing a large number of concurrent calls
• Managing calls around the clock without a decline in speed or quality
• Managing calls in multiple languages
• Little maintenance expenses

If your call-reliant part of business is about repetitive and predictable tasks, AI all agents might be a good addition, if not the complete replacement, of human operators. But then again, you still have to be able to provide one-on-one conversations to those who need it.

Can AI Call Agents Replace Live Operators?

I doubt AI call agents will ever be able to fully replace live operators while preserving the quality of service unless engineering gets to the point of creating organic AI, if ever. Taking this to the very ground level, the fundamental problem with AI in all manifestations is that it’s a non-organic entity – silicon, metal, plastic, etc. – that behaves differently than the organic matter we’re made of.

So, given the seemingly unfixable differences in the underlying nature of AI call agents and live operators, I wouldn’t rush to replace the latter with the former. AI is great in many regards, but it’s important to recognize its limits.

AI Call Agents with Phonexa for Advanced Call Routing

Phonexa’s AI call center software, Call Logic, has found great success with companies processing inbound and outbound calls, and it’s now updated with AI Call Agents that take it even further, enabling around-the-clock availability for your business and independent request resolution.

Here are some of the things AI Call Agents can do within Call Logic IVR:

Industry-Specific Call Flows	Trained to conduct conversations in the industry-specific context, Phonexa’s AI Call Agents ensure unmatched intent understanding and response precision. In practice, you can select a ready-made template for your industry and edit it however you see fit.
Round-the-Clock Business Availability	With AI Call Agents, your business is available 24/7 across time zones. Moreover, AI Call Agents can provide basic information and process simpler requests on the spot. This way, you can be cost-efficient while not overloading sales and support reps.
Improved Personalization	With AI Call Agents factoring in real-time user feedback, you can personalize conversations while handling any number of calls simultaneously. With Call Logic IVR, you can build a custom tree of responses to maximize your system’s flexibility.
Enhanced Communication	Callers can use voice commands or touchpad selections, which allow them to communicate on the go. Likewise, you can upload any custom IVR voice, including your brand voice.
Enhanced Call Routing	With AI Call Agents, call routing is no longer pre-determined but is based on the conversation. For example, if the AI recognizes that the caller needs customer support, the system will connect them to a relevant customer support rep rather than a sales rep, even if it was the originally set route.
Pre-Launch Testing for Safe Launch	As a Phonexa user, you can test our conversational AI and call agents before upgrading your call flows. You can put yourself in the caller’s shoes and adjust the IVR system for the best experience.

The best thing is that Call Logic IVR isn’t an isolated piece of software but an integral part of Phonexa’s performance and affiliate marketing software suite, which means it integrates with seven other Products, including our web lead solution, LMS Sync. Free data flows allow you to unlock your full lead distribution potential, routing your web and call leads to the best buyer.

 

Likewise, you can integrate AI Call Agents without disrupting your existing call flows. Added to Phonexa IVR as customizable blocks, AI Call Agents automatically capture the configurations of the connected Call Logic products, ensuring a personalized call progression for every caller.

Take a product tour to experience Phonexa’s eight call and web lead products in sync.

Phonexa’s Predictive Modeling to Safely Explore Uncharted Territories

Phonexa’s predictive modeling software, an integral part of Call Logic, is the pinnacle of AI capabilities. Based on all the data amassed during months and years of operation, predictive modeling software can simulate call campaigns without any investment on your side.

As a marketer, you can change multiple variables to generate a series of campaigns – in fact, an unlimited number of different call campaigns – to choose the winners and avoid wasting time and money on the losers. You can change your price per lead, lead source, and many other factors to find your success formula – all within minutes and without risk.

Phonexa’s Cloud PBX: Your All-in-One Dedicated Cloud Call Center

For serious businesses, you surely want to be in full control of your call or contact center and also have some redundancy to avoid sudden outages. With Cloud PBX, you can get all of that and more, enabling 24/7 uptime for your call center, accurate call scoring, outbound calling, and cross-reporting, among other features.

Integrating Cloud PBX into Phonexa’s software ecosystem doesn’t require you to stop operating or adjust your call flows. Our support team will smoothly connect Cloud PBX to your software suite, so you can instantly use its increased security and other benefits.

Your Complete Software Suite to Handle Phone Calls and Web Leads

As good as our conversational AI and call agents AI within Call Logic, it only covers one marketing avenue – phone calls – while you also need to tackle your email, social media, SMS, referral, affiliate, and possibly even traditional marketing campaigns.

This is why we’ve made sure Call Logic synergizes with the rest of our products. Long story short, you get a best-in-class eight-in-one performance marketing ecosystem that can easily cover all marketing dimensions across touchpoints and interactions. At the same time, all this data is pulled to a single unified dashboard, so you are always up to date and in the driver’s seat of your business.

“Put everything in one place – that’s what we tried to do. Phonexa is about tracking everything – the call outcomes, the source of the calls, the route that the call went through, which publisher it came from, which IVR model it went through, which buyer bought the lead, and what happened next – and then reporting on everything to the point where you can then analyze it in real-time.” – David Pickard, Global CEO at Phonexa

Last but not least, with our improved Ping Post Calls 2.0, you can be sure you’re effectively converting the collected caller and campaign insights into buying or selling your calls at the best price to reliable partners. 

 

Here are the eight proprietary solutions you can get at a single price (online price calculator):

Build your plan now, or take a product tour for a sneak peek into Phonexa’s dashboard.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you create an AI agent?

With Phonexa’s Call Logic, you can drag and drop the pre-built responses for your AI agent, or you can create custom responses. Either way, Phonexa’s AI Call Agents smoothly integrate into Call Logic IVR as blocks, and you don’t even have to reorganize your call flows.

When should I use AI agents?

AI agents can be used for almost any task, especially routine tasks that don’t require regular human input: basic customer support, automatic fraud detection, lead distribution, and other things that involve data collection, processing, and analytics. Industry-wise, AI agents are especially popular in finance, banking, insurance, and other digital business avenues.

Will AI replace human agents?

Not exactly. AI isn’t here to replace human agents, but to amplify them. Think of AI as a human enablement tool: it takes on repetitive, routine tasks so people can focus on complex problem-solving, creativity, and human connection—things machines simply can’t replicate. As one expert insightfully put it, even with all the computing power in the world, it would still take a human to give the work purpose. Therefore, AI works best not instead of people, but alongside them.