The United States Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has deployed Ace, an AI agent built by Salesforce.
Since going live during the summer travel surge, Ace has handled approximately 100,000 routine traveler conversations per month and resolved 96% of routine inquiries – such as how to pack liquids or enter a checkpoint with a medical device – without human escalation. The deployment is part of a broader modernization initiative led by the TSA’s customer experience branch to improve traveler service with Salesforce.
By using an AI agent to answer routine questions and direct more complex needs to staff, Salesforce says TSA can improve service and control costs. Previously, sharing data between internal systems was a slow and manual process that took 10 minutes per transaction. Now, 70,000 transactions are projected to be automated annually, freeing up over 11,660 staff hours for mission-critical work.
Consumer interactions used to cost more than US$4 per conversation, and it is estimated that TSA’s applications will save US$11m over three years. Salesforce predicts that Ace has already lowered the cost of consumer interactions by over 90%.
To fill the gaps left by its older systems, TSA needed the equivalent of 12 full-time employees to tackle excess workloads. Ace is designed to tackle the routine work and backlogs so employees can focus on high-priority cases.
In related news, San José airport launches AI-powered humanoid robot pilot
