Bank of America has deployed a new in-house generative AI assistant, AskGPS, for its corporate payments division. The tool is designed to provide instant answers to complex client questions, freeing up employees from hours of manual research.
An hour to seconds: The bank says AskGPS replaces a manual research process that once took up to an hour—including calls to specialists across time zones—with a tool that delivers answers in seconds. The move, it claims, could save tens of thousands of employee hours annually. The AI was trained on a library of more than 3,000 internal files to handle queries for the division's 40,000 business clients.
Not their first rodeo: The launch is the latest move in the bank's long-running AI strategy, which started with its consumer-facing chatbot, Erica, back in 2018. The company has been building its AI arsenal for years, filing 1,200 patents for AI and machine learning alone. That investment is paying off, earning the bank a spot in the top 10 of the annual Evident AI Index for the first time.
By focusing on internal-facing tools that create immediate efficiency gains, Bank of America is placing a clear bet on using AI to improve productivity first, rather than chasing speculative tech trends. The move comes as competitors make their own AI plays, with Citigroup mandating AI prompt-writing training for 175,000 employees and tech firm Temenos launching its own AI treasury platform. Bank of America's customer-focused approach to tech was previously highlighted when it explored and then dismissed the metaverse because, as an executive noted, "no customer was asking us for that."
