Answers
Dual CX, in plain answers.
The questions leaders ask most about customer AI agents, the four modes of service and the Service Handshake. Short answer first, detail underneath.
What is Dual CX?
Dual CX is customer experience where either side of a service conversation can be represented by AI. Brands already run AI on their side. Customers now arrive with their own AI too, pasting your emails into ChatGPT, drafting complaints, comparing tariffs and increasingly letting the AI place the call. CX has two designers now, and Dual CX is the framework for designing service when both sides can have AI.
Read the answer →What are the four modes of service?
Every service interaction now sits in one of four modes, depending on whether each side is a person or an AI. Mode 1 is human to human. Mode 2 is a customer talking to the brand's AI. Mode 3 is the customer's AI talking to a human agent. Mode 4 is the customer's AI talking to the brand's AI. Most CX investment is in Mode 2; most CX risk is in Modes 3 and 4.
Read the answer →What is Mode 4 in customer service?
Mode 4 is a service interaction between two AI agents: the customer's AI and the brand's AI, each acting for its principal with no human in the loop. It is the fastest and most efficient mode of service, and the most dangerous, because without shared structure every interaction is a negotiation from scratch.
Read the answer →What is the Service Handshake?
The Service Handshake is an open, vendor-independent standard that sets the terms whenever AI is part of a service conversation. Before the interaction proceeds, each party declares six things: its goals, options and constraints, data permissions, fallback rules, cost parameters and authority level. It is part of the Dual CX framework, published under CC BY 4.0, and the current version is SH-1.2.
Read the answer →How do I get my contact centre ready for customer AI agents?
Start by assuming customer AI is already reaching you, then design for it on purpose. Make your own AI declare that it is AI and what it can do. Give your team a protocol for when a customer's AI calls. Check an agent's delegated authority before acting on it. Publish what AI agents may do with you. And design the hand-off to a person, with context, for when things don't line up.
Read the answer →Are UK brands ready for customer AI agents?
No. The State of Dual CX audit (Q1 2026) tested 100 UK brands across 17 sectors. None had declared what an AI agent may do on their service. None declared the authority their AI can commit to or will accept. 73% had no fallback path for when an AI agent contacts them. And an AI agent passed 17 distinct verification flows undetected, including multi-step KYC on regulated services.
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