OpenAI is moving further into the customer experience market with a new platform aimed at helping large companies deploy AI agents that can communicate with customers, access internal systems and complete approved transactions.
The product, called OpenAI Presence, is designed for real-time voice and chat interactions across customer-facing and internal workflows. Potential uses include resolving billing questions, processing refunds, supporting insurance claims, handling IT requests and assisting with outbound sales.
For credit and collection companies, the launch illustrates how quickly AI is evolving from a tool that generates responses into technology capable of completing full workflows.
Presence is not a self-service software product. It is initially available to eligible enterprise customers through a limited general availability program, with OpenAI engineers and selected systems integrators helping companies identify workflows, connect data sources, establish permissions and test agents before deployment.
The platform creates a shared foundation for company policies, approved actions, guardrails, escalation rules and performance evaluations. Each agent is given access only to the information and systems required for its assigned task. Companies can determine which actions the agent may perform independently, which require approval and when the interaction must be transferred to a human employee.
That governance layer may be particularly important for regulated industries. An AI agent discussing an account, verifying a consumer’s identity or processing a payment must operate within carefully defined legal, compliance and security boundaries.
Presence also includes simulations and automated evaluations intended to test agents against routine questions, unusual situations and higher-risk scenarios before they are released. After deployment, the platform monitors performance signals and uses OpenAI’s Codex coding agent to investigate problems and propose improvements. Changes are tested against the production version before they are approved.
OpenAI said Presence is already powering its English-language telephone support channel. The company reported that the agent resolves 75% of inbound issues without human assistance and that its improvement process reduced transfers to human agents by 15 percentage points over 10 days. The results have not been independently verified.
Early users include BBVA Mexico, SoftBank and Australian insurer IAG, which are testing the platform for financial services, Japanese-language customer interactions and insurance support.
Pricing and broader availability have not been disclosed. Still, the launch underscores a growing reality for businesses evaluating AI: success may depend less on selecting a model and more on controlling what the agent can access, what it is allowed to do and how quickly mistakes can be identified and corrected.
