{"id":63350,"date":"2026-03-04T18:12:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-04T23:12:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=63350"},"modified":"2026-03-04T18:12:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-04T23:12:13","slug":"new-ai-customer-service-agent-for-lakeland-electric","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2026\/03\/04\/new-ai-customer-service-agent-for-lakeland-electric\/","title":{"rendered":"New AI Customer Service Agent for Lakeland Electric"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

That is correct! On March 2, 2026, the Lakeland City Commissioners unanimously approved a five-year agreement to introduce CayLa<\/strong>, a hyper-realistic AI call agent, to the Lakeland Electric customer service team.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the utility faces growing demand and a rise in customer complaints regarding long wait times, CayLa is stepping in to modernize the “traditional phone tree” experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meet CayLa: Not Your Average Chatbot<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unlike older systems that force you to “press 1 for billing,” CayLa is designed to be conversational<\/strong>. You can speak to her in plain language, just like you would to a human representative.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Feature<\/strong><\/td>Details<\/strong><\/td><\/tr><\/thead>
Launch Date<\/strong><\/td>Early March 2026<\/td><\/tr>
Primary Tasks<\/strong><\/td>Balance inquiries, payment plans, and service transfers (move-ins\/move-outs).<\/td><\/tr>
Availability<\/strong><\/td>Initially limited to business hours for monitoring, though capable of 24\/7 operation.<\/td><\/tr>
Target Load<\/strong><\/td>Expected to handle roughly 20%<\/strong> of routine calls initially.<\/td><\/tr>
Cost<\/strong><\/td>$92,500<\/strong> for the first year (including setup), with roughly $70k\u2013$75k annually after.<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n

Why the Change?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \n
  • Wait Times:<\/strong> General Manager Mike Bush noted that even a 90-second wait can feel like an eternity for customers. CayLa provides “instant gratification” for simple tasks.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • The “Scream Factor”:<\/strong> The utility specifically chose a platform (provided by Cayenta) that is natural and back-and-forth to avoid the frustration typically associated with automated AI.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • Growth Without Layoffs:<\/strong> The city confirmed there are no plans to eliminate jobs<\/strong>. Instead, CayLa will act as a “release valve” so human agents can focus on complex issues while the city continues to grow.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n

    The Safety Net<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    If CayLa senses you’re getting frustrated, or if your problem is too complex for her to solve, she is programmed to transfer you immediately to a live human agent<\/strong>. You can also request a human representative at any point during the call.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    That is correct! On March 2, 2026, the Lakeland City Commissioners unanimously approved a five-year agreement to introduce CayLa, a hyper-realistic AI call agent, to the Lakeland Electric customer service… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":63351,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"7591","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9sYWtlbGFuZGdhemV0dGUuaW5mb1wvbmV3c1wvd3AtY29udGVudFwvdXBsb2Fkc1wvMjAyNlwvMDNcL2ltYWdlcy53ZWJwP2ZpdD00NDclMkMxMTMmc3NsPTEiLCJ0eHQiOiJOZXcgQUkgQ3VzdG9tZXIgU2VydmljZSBBZ2VudCBmb3IgTGFrZWxhbmQgRWxlY3RyaWMiLCJ0ZW1wbGF0ZSI6ImhpZ2h3YXkiLCJmb250IjoiIiwiYmxvZ19pZCI6MTYzMDQwNjYxfQ.gMLd3ngM9H_Fmr2e79W6gCLgyeY3ekDQVn46DFQLCTMMQ"},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[7591],"tags":[13923],"class_list":["post-63350","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-city-of-lakeland","tag-new-ai-customer-service-agent-for-lakeland-electric"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63350","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63350"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63350\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":63352,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63350\/revisions\/63352"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63350"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63350"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63350"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}