Travelers on trips abroad message one WhatsApp help line. After office hours an AI agent answers routine questions from the trip's itinerary, urgent issues trigger a call to the duty manager with a summary, and everything else waits as a morning ticket.
Typical results
Under 2 min
Typical reply to a routine question after hours
Under 5 min
From an urgent message to a call to the duty manager
≈60%
Night questions answered without staff
Figures reflect typical results for this kind of automation.
The challenge
With groups traveling in different time zones, the duty manager's phone rings through the night with questions about meeting times, hotel addresses and luggage limits. Most of these are already in the itinerary, but each call wakes someone up. Genuine emergencies, like a lost passport or a missed flight, compete with routine messages for the same tired attention.
Before and after
Night calls to the duty manager per week
−70%Minutes to answer a routine night question
−96%Urgent messages reaching a manager within 5 min
+58%The automation
Travelers on every trip message one WhatsApp help line. After office hours, an AI agent answers routine questions from that trip's itinerary and supplier notes, such as meeting times, hotel addresses and luggage rules. Messages about missed flights, lost passports, medical issues or safety are flagged as urgent and trigger a phone call to the duty manager with a summary. Everything else is logged as a ticket for the morning team with the traveler's booking attached.
How it works
- 01
One WhatsApp help line
Travelers on every trip message the same WhatsApp number, and after office hours the AI agent takes the conversation.
- 02
Routine questions answered
Meeting times, hotel addresses and luggage rules are answered from that trip's itinerary and supplier notes.
- 03
Urgent messages flagged
Missed flights, lost passports, medical issues and safety concerns are flagged as urgent the moment they arrive.
- 04
Duty manager called
An urgent flag triggers a phone call to the duty manager with a short summary and the traveler's booking.
- 05
Tickets for the morning
Everything else is logged as a ticket for the morning team with the conversation and the booking attached.
Starts from
- Traveler WhatsApp message
- Itinerary and supplier notes
Delivers
- Routine answer on WhatsApp
- Urgent call to duty manager
- Ticket for the morning team
The impact
Night calls to the duty manager fall by about 70%, from roughly 20 a week to 6, and the calls that remain are real emergencies. Routine questions get an answer in about two minutes instead of 45, and the morning team starts with a sorted list of open tickets.
Questions about this automation
How does the agent know which trip a traveler is on?
The traveler's phone number is matched to their booking, which links to the trip's itinerary, hotels and supplier notes for each day. The agent answers only from those documents. If a question isn't covered, it says so and logs a ticket for the morning team instead of guessing an answer.
What counts as urgent, and what if the duty manager doesn't answer?
The operator sets the urgent categories, which by default cover missed flights, lost documents, medical issues and safety. If the duty manager doesn't pick up within five minutes, the call goes to a backup manager, and the traveler is told help is on the way along with the local emergency number.
What is needed to set this up?
A WhatsApp business number, the itineraries and supplier notes for each trip, the booking list with travelers' phone numbers and an on-call rota. Calls go out through a voice service such as Twilio. This is a multi-step build, usually rolled out in stages, often starting with a single trip.