Tax season was breaking the system
Even though it's bright and early, Julie’s already on hold. She’s a parent trying to help her son sort out a missing 1098-T tax form so he can finish his FAFSA. The line crackles. Still waiting. She sighs and checks the time again. It’s been twenty minutes, and she’s got back-to-back meetings all morning. She wonders if she should just give up and call again tomorrow. But tax deadlines don’t wait.
Scenes like this played out across ECSI’s contact centers every winter and summer. Agents jumped from tax form questions to refund issues to complex loan servicing calls, many of which came from frustrated parents trying to navigate the process on behalf of their kids.
For the ECSI team, this was more than a temporary spike. These volume surges hit hard with no end in sight. Hiring to meet seasonal demand had become nearly impossible, and their legacy IVR couldn’t keep up.
ECSI is a leading provider of accounts receivable management for campus-based student loans. In 2022 alone, they fielded nearly 1.4 million calls across three contact centers. The pressure on staff was relentless, and leadership knew something had to change.
"Automation has become integral to what we do. Our business is dramatically different today with Replicant," said Mike Bowman, former Senior Director of Operations at ECSI. "It’s really made a difference in our employees’ lives and the experience from the borrowers and parents who call us, as well as how we run our business."Â
AI at the front desk, built for the rush
Bowman led the search for a solution that could scale on demand, maintain a high-touch experience, and reduce the burden on his agents. After evaluating multiple vendors, ECSI chose Replicant’s AI agents to serve as their automated front desk. The AI agents authenticate callers, capture intents, and resolve or route calls across their three most seasonal products: tax form processing, refunds, and loan servicing.
Replicant’s AI agents were deployed to handle call spikes while surfacing insights that had never been visible before. The implementation was collaborative, transparent, and fast. ECSI’s team was involved in every step to make sure the solution reflected the realities of their business.
How it worked:
- Contained and routed calls for tax forms, refunds, and loan servicing
- Authenticated customers up front to save agents time
- Identified caller intents and delivered real-time insights
- Enabled unlimited scalability during seasonal peaks
"Last year's biggest win for us wasn't just the $1.5 million dollars we saved with automation," said Bowman. "Replicant’s AI agents were really good at showing us what we weren't doing well. It’s collecting information to show us what are the obstacles, where people are getting stuck. We can use that data to design a better process, to design a better website, to start new solutions."
Immediate tax help without the hold music
Today, when someone like Julie calls with a question about a tax form, Replicant’s AI agents answer ECSI’s front desk 24/7 with no wait times. They greet every caller instantly, authenticate them, and handle routine requests or route them to the right place with a full summary in hand.
Even when a call is escalated, agents no longer have to repeat steps or dig for context. That means faster conversations, smoother resolutions, and less burnout. And because every interaction is logged and categorized, ECSI now uses insights from Replicant to improve their website, optimize self-service tools, and proactively address friction.
ECSI also surveyed customers to understand how this new experience felt. The results were clear, satisfaction was just as high whether callers spoke with a human agent or an AI agent.
Transformational results:
- 1.5 million dollars in annual savings
- 40 percent decrease in escalation handle times
- 70 percent faster agent response times
"The reason you got our business is because you're honest, straightforward and responsive," said Bowman. "You were very inclusive with my team, showing them how things work and making them part of the build process. There was just a lot of transparency, openness, and honesty. You would hope this isn't true, but you just don't see that everywhere."
