Tuesday August 25th 2026
Inverclyde Council leader, Councillor Stephen McCabe, launched the new chatbot back in March
Written by Glasgow View Reporter, Liam Eunson
An online assistant designed to improve how Inverclyde residents access and use council services online has been hailed a success after more than four months in the job.
The chatbot – called Clyde – started in March 2026 to help visitors to the council’s website find what they’re looking for.
Clyde is designed to be a conversational assistant which allows users to ask questions in the same way they would speak to a member of staff rather than a simple search engine.
Since they started on the job, Clyde has answered almost 8,000 questions, handled more than 4,300 conversations and received positive feedback.
The number one topic each month has been bins, recycling and waste followed by council tax, benefits and financial support, roads, parking and streets, and housing with social care, schools and registrars close behind.
The stats show that Clyde handled queries across more than 640 distinct topic areas covering the full breadth of council and HSCP services. Feedback from users show satisfaction with Clyde has risen from 59 per cent to 68 per cent.
The investment in the chatbot is part of the council’s commitment to the digital transformation of public services.
The aim is to enable residents to quickly and easily access the information they’re looking for, rather than contact the contact centre, and to free up contact centre staff to work on more complex duties. The chatbot has not been introduced to replace staff.
Leader of Inverclyde Council, Councillor Stephen McCabe said: “These figures show that Clyde has been very busy during their first few months on the job.
“We will use the data collected by Clyde to better understand what our residents are looking for and how we can continue to improve our services.
“I am pleased that the satisfaction with Clyde has grown since it began and I hope the council’s digital transformation journey continues to have a positive impact for our residents.”
As well as being available 24/7, Clyde is multilingual and accessible as it offers text and voice interaction options.
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