Sammons Financial Group gives callers on-demand account support with Agentforce

2 million calls, routine to urgent

For generations, Sammons Financial Group (SFG) has helped individuals and families plan for retirement, build a legacy, and find stability after losing a loved one. “We’ve been around for a hundred years,” said Aaron Witt, Chief Digital & Data Officer. “Our oldest life insurance policy was issued in 1938 and we're still caring for that policy today.”

As their business grew, reps were handling 2 million service calls a year, with 800,000 flowing to two specialty contact centers that handled inquiries about life and annuity policy values, benefit amounts, and address updates. Because calls were handled in order, a customer with an urgent claim waited alongside someone checking a balance.

SFG wanted to make routine service faster and more accessible, while preserving their reps’ time for the moments when customers needed them most.

Case updates without the wait

To give customers faster support for routine calls, SFG introduced Help Agents powered by Agentforce Voice in two contact centers: the Life Customer Contact Center and the Annuity Customer Contact Center. Available 24/7, Agentforce handles common account status questions like checking the progress of an existing request or sharing a current policy value — without waiting for a rep.

“Their inquiry can be resolved in a matter of minutes,” said Jackie Cockrum, VP, Annuity & Life Administration. “For our most requested services, customers no longer have to wait on hold — we can offer immediate support through Agentforce Voice.”

For customers, that support starts with a simple conversation. For example, imagine someone recently requested an annuity withdrawal and wants to know when it will be completed. The call is routed to Agentforce, which securely authenticates the customer, determines what they want to know, and shares an accurate, detailed answer — all in the same conversation.

Agentforce stays focused on the requests it’s designed to handle, including case status and policy value questions. If a customer asks about something outside those areas, the call is rerouted to SFG’s service team so a rep can step in.

The right path for every call

All calls start in Salesforce Amazon Contact Center, which powers SFG’s existing IVR phone system. There, the customer’s policy number is securely validated against unique identifiers in Salesforce. Customers asking about case status or policy values are routed to Agentforce, while those with more nuanced needs go directly to SFG’s service team.

For calls routed to Agentforce, before accessing account information, Agentforce securely authenticates the customer using SFG’s established verification controls. Agentforce then listens for intent. If someone says, “I’m calling about my illness claim,” it uses natural language processing and SFG’s case descriptions to identify the case type and find the right case in Agentforce Financial Services. If several cases match, Agentforce asks follow-up questions to narrow the results.

Once Agentforce identifies the right case or account, it retrieves the current status and service timeline from SFG’s Queue Subscription object in Salesforce. Agentforce turns that data into a conversational response and can also retrieve cash, surrender, and specified account values.

Because Agentforce works with existing cases, it doesn’t need to create a new one. Salesforce Amazon Contact Center automatically captures call activity, customer verification, and data retrieval in the Voice Call record, along with transcripts and recordings. AI-powered quality assurance then uses these records to evaluate each call against SFG’s’ standards. This creates a centralized record for consistent, auditable reporting — especially important in financial services.

More time for empathetic service

Agentforce now handles about 1,000 calls a week, while AI-powered quality assurance has expanded call review coverage from 3% to 100%. The result is more inquiries handled faster, with consistent service customers can trust.

“We analyzed our call volumes and found that policy value was the number one reason customers were calling, followed by case status,” said Andrew Walling, AVP, Capability Planning & Delivery. “Agentforce Voice helps us address those high-volume needs quickly while our contact center representatives focus on the interactions that benefit most from human judgment and empathy.”

SFG moved from Agentforce kickoff to go-live in 11 weeks, with Agentforce taking its first call within 22 minutes of launch. In the first two weeks, Agentforce handled more than 180 calls on nights and weekends and helped save more than 92,000 minutes of rep time in its first six months. 

That shift means giving reps more time for the work that needs a human touch. “By delegating simple tasks to an agent, Agentforce helps us elevate the services our employees are able to provide,” said Cockrum. “AI is freeing them up to empathetically answer more nuanced questions.”