Help centre in your languages
Hypothetical. Not a client, not a result.
// The problem
A city utility serves customers who speak many languages, its help pages exist only in English, and the call centre fills up with the same questions about bills, moving and water quality notices.
// What we would build
A help centre in English, French and the languages your customers speak, with an assistant that answers from the approved articles, cites them and hands over to a person. Active notices are shown first. The assistant answers general questions; it does not see accounts, and it never gives health or safety advice beyond the notice itself.
// What is in it
- Help articles on bills, moving, meters and notices, translated and reviewed
- An assistant that answers only from approved articles, and cites them
- Active boil-water notices and shutoffs shown before anything else
- A handover to a person by phone, email or chat
- An evaluation set of real customer questions, run before every change
// Stack
- Next.js
- Claude API
- PostgreSQL with pgvector
- Translation management platform
- AWS Canada
// estimate
- Build
- ≈ US$94,800 to US$145,000, delivered within 23 weeksCAD 135,000 to 206,400
- Hosting
- ≈ US$218 a monthCAD 310 a month
- Support
- ≈ US$2,500 a monthCAD 3,565 a month
Prices in your currency are estimates from today's Bank of Canada rate. All invoicing is in CAD or USD.
- AI route
- Frontier model
- Model running cost
- ≈ US$42 a monthCAD 60 a month
Timeline by milestone
- Discovery
- 2.9 to 3.4 weeks
- Specification and evaluation plan
- 0.4 weeks
- Design approved
- 2.4 to 3.4 weeks
- Notice templates approved by the people responsible at your utility
- 1.4 to 1.9 weeks
- Core features
- 1.4 to 1.9 weeks
- Full build
- 0.9 to 1.4 weeks
- Working pilot
- 3.9 to 6.4 weeks
- Testing and fixes
- 0.9 to 1.9 weeks
- Launch
- 0.9 to 1.4 weeks
- Production
- 0.9 to 1.4 weeks
How it is paid
- Deposit 20%
- CAD 27,000 to 41,280
- Discovery 1.8%
- CAD 2,430.00 to 3,715.20
- Specification and evaluation plan 8.9%
- CAD 12,015.00 to 18,369.60
- Design approved 1.8%
- CAD 2,430.00 to 3,715.20
- Notice templates approved by the people responsible at your utility 8.7%
- CAD 11,745.00 to 17,956.80
- Core features 5.4%
- CAD 7,290.00 to 11,145.60
- Full build 3.6%
- CAD 4,860.00 to 7,430.40
- Working pilot 26.9%
- CAD 36,315.00 to 55,521.60
- Testing and fixes 1.8%
- CAD 2,430.00 to 3,715.20
- Launch 1.8%
- CAD 2,430.00 to 3,715.20
- Production 9.3%
- CAD 12,555.00 to 19,195.20
- Holdback, 30 days after launch (10%)
- CAD 13,500 to 20,640