Banking Bot – Update Balance

This is document details steps in creating a sample banking bot. This bot is used in various use case scenarios presented in the How-Tos section of the developer documentation.

Prerequisites:

You must have signed up with the Kore.ai Bots Platform
You must be aware of the basics of Bot building (refer to this link)
You must have created a simple bot (refer here for an example)
You must have created a Banking Bot with Get Balance task (refer here for example)

Bot Overview

The Bot we will be building will be performing the basic banking transactions.
This Bot will:

Get account balance based on the Account Number and Account Type entered by the user, as seen here.
Update accounts with the balance.
Transfer a specified amount from the payer account to a payee account.

Let us add the Update Balance task.

Update Balance Intent

The Update Balance task will prompt the user to enter account number and the account type (Savings/Current).
It would then prompt for the type of update – credit or debit and the amount to be updated.
A service call will be made to fetch the details, calculate the balance and then another service call to update the balance.
The success/failure message will be displayed.

Step 1: Dialog Task

Open the Banking Bot with Get Balance task already configured, see here for more.
Navigate to the Bot Task page, by hovering over the left navigation panel and selecting Bot Tasks.
Click on the + in the Dialog Tasks section.
New Bot Task screen will open.
Enter the following details:
- Intent Name – Enter the Intent name, this is the phrase that triggers the dialog. The intent name should be simple and not more than 3-4 words. For example, ‘Update Balance‘.
- Under the More Options, you can add a description and other dialog related details. Let’s retain the default settings without any changes.
Click Create & Proceed.
Property Panel for User Intent will be displayed. We will retain the default properties.
Close the User Intent Property Panel.

Step 2: Entity nodes

Entity Node is typically used to gather information from the user.
Here we will be using it to capture the user input for Account Number and Account Type, Type of transaction and the Amount.

Click the + next to the User Intent node
Select the Entity option.
- Select the Account Number entity already created while configuring the Get Balance task.
- Close the AccountNumber Entity Property Panel.
Click the + next to the Account Number node
Select the Entity option.
- Select the Account Type entity already created while configuring the Get Balance task.
- Close the AccountType Entity Property Panel.
Click the + next to the Account Type node
Select the Entity option.
- Click the New entity node +
- Property Panel for the Entity Node is displayed
  - Enter the following details:
    - Name: TransactionType
    - Display Name: Transaction Type
    - Type: Select ‘List of Items (enumerated)‘ from the drop-down. We need to provide the list of values that the user can select.
      - Click on the Settings icon that appears next to the field.
      - Opt for Static List.
      - Enter the following options under separate rows as the Display name – Credit and Debit.
        Value and Synonym columns will auto-populate, leave them as is.
      - Click Save.
    - Navigate back to Entity Property Panel.
    - User Prompts: Enter the following text and hit enter to save:
      Select the transaction type.
    - Display List Of Values: Mark as ‘Yes, use channel specific standard formatting for default messages and show the available list of values to end user‘. This will present the list of values in a button template for the supported channels.
  - Close the TransactionType Entity Property Panel.
Click the + next to the Transaction Type node
Select the Entity option.
- Click the New entity node +
- Property Panel for the Entity Node is displayed
- Enter the following details:
  - Name: Amount
  - Display Name: Amount
  - Type: Number
  - User Prompts: Enter the following text and hit enter to save: Enter the amount to transfer
- Close the Amount Entity Property Panel.

Step 3: Service Node – Get Balance

Service Node allows you to make a backend API call.
Here the service node is used to call an API to get account balance for the user entered account number.
We will be using a dummy API setup for this tutorial. We will be using a mock API created specifically for this purpose with the following fields – FirstName, LastName, Address, City, Country, ZipCode, AccountNumber, AccountType, Balance.

Click the + next to the Amount Entity node
Select Service – Service node is used to make a backend API call to get account balance information.
Click the New service node +
Property Panel for the Service Node is displayed
Enter the following details:
- Name: GetAccountBalance
- Display Name: Get Account Balance
- Service Type: Custom Service
- Type: Webservice
- Sub Type: REST
- Click DEFINE REQUEST
  - In the Define Request Page, enter the following details:
    - Request type – GET
    - Request URL – https://5c3c633d29429300143fe4d2.mockapi.io/AccountDetails?filter={{context.entities.AccountNumber}}
      Due to the limitations of the dummy API service, instead of fetching the record for the given account number we are filtering the response for the required account number.
    - This API does not require any Auth, or Header Parameters.
    - Select the Test Request tab
    - Enter an account number in the Sample Context Values section. This is the filter parameter needed by the API, you can use the following account number 02929664.
    - Click the Test button
    - Wait for the test to be completed and you get a Status: 200
    - As you can see an array of records is returned by the API call, in the next step we will be parsing the values using JavaScript.
    - Click Save as Sample Response
    - Click Save
- Close the Service Property Panel

Step 4: Script Node

Script Node allows you to incorporate programming logic to the bot.
Here the script node is used to credit/debit the user entered amount to/from the account.

Click the + next to the GetAccountBalance node
Select Script – Script node is used to calculate the balance to be updated.
Click the New script node +
Property Panel for the Script Node is displayed
Enter the following details:
- Name: BalanceCalculation
- Display Name: Balance Calculation
- Under Script Definition section click the Define Script link
- In the Add Script window enter the following script.This script first checks the account type to match the user entry and then extracts the balance for that record
```
var balance, i;
for (i=0; i < context.GetAccountBalance.response.body.length; i++ )
{ if (context.GetAccountBalance.response.body[i].AccountType == context.entities.AccountType)
   { balance = parseFloat(context.GetAccountBalance.response.body[i].Balance);
   }
}
```
- Click Save
Close the Script Property Panel

Step 4: Service Node – Update Balance

Here the service node is used to call an API to update the account balance for the user entered account number.
We will be using a dummy API setup for this tutorial.

Click the + next to the BalanceCalculation Script node
Select Service – Service node is used to make a backend API call to update account balance information.
Click the New service node +
Property Panel for the Service Node is displayed
Enter the following details:
- Name: UpdateBalance
- Display Name: Update Balance
- Service Type: Custom Service
- Type: Webservice
- Sub Type: REST
- Click DEFINE REQUEST
  - In the Define Request Page, enter the following details:
    - Request type – PUT
    - Request URL –https://5c3c633d29429300143fe4d2.mockapi.io/AccountDetails/{{context.entities.AccountNumber}}.
    - This API does not require any Auth Parameters.
    - In the Body tab, select the type as application/json
    - Select the Test Request tab
    - Enter an account number and balance in the Sample Context Values section.
    - Click the Test button
    - Wait for the test to be completed and you get a Status: 200
    - Click Save as Sample Response
    - Click Save
- Close the Service Property Panel

Step 5: Message Node

A Message Node is used to display a message from the Bot to the user.
Here we will be using the Message node to show the success message.

Click the + next to the GetAccountBalance Service node
Select Message and click the ‘New message node +‘
Property Panel for the Message Node is displayed
Enter the following details:
- Name: UpdateMessage
- Display Name: Update Message
- Bot Responses: Enter Your account balance has been updated and hit enter to save
On the Bot Response Property Panel, open the connections tab by clicking the ‘Connections‘ icon.
- Change the Default connection from ‘Not Connected‘ to ‘End of Dialog‘.
- Click Save.
Close the Property Panel.

Test

To test the Dialog task, you can use the ‘Talk to bot’ at the bottom right corner.
Enter the following utterance (intent name) – “Get Balance”
Follow the Bot instructions:

Enter Account Number – 29565731;
Select Account Type – Savings or Current;
Select the Transaction Type – Credit or Debit;
Enter the Amount – 100;
See the success message.

Next Steps

Your Banking Bot is almost complete, you have successfully added Get Balance and Update Balance dialog tasks to the Bot. The next step would be to include the Transfer Funds task. Click here to continue.

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