N OW says Raleigh, North Carolina cut IT service desk costs 66% with ServiceNow AI agents

Raleigh is the first municipal government to deploy autonomous workers using ServiceNow's IT Service Desk AI Specialist SANTA CLARA, Calif.--()--October 08, 2026-- ServiceNow (NYSE: NOW), the Super Intelligence Control Tower for business reinvention, today announced that the City of Raleigh is the first municipal government to put ServiceNow's IT Service Desk AI Specialist into production. Raleigh is adding new residents everyday, and that steady growth has created more requests, tickets, and pressure on a lean team. The city is keeping pace, while increasing productivity, with AI agents and specialists built on the ServiceNow AI Platform. The challenge: keeping pace with one of the fastest-growing cities in the country Raleigh's help desk staff of four people supports 4,400 city employees, while the city fields roughly 300,000 resident service calls each year. A decade of IT, HR, facilities, and security workflows on ServiceNow had already given the city a deep knowledge base, but as internal ticket volume climbed, more of the team's day went to routine device and connectivity questions and less to the complex problems and service improvements that matter most to employees and residents. The solution: AI agents that help guide, resolve, and scale Raleigh built 'Ral-E,' a ServiceNow AI agent that guides employees through self-service requests and answers questions from the city's knowledge base across IT, HR, and facilities. Each conversation is unique to the problem at hand, getting employees an answer or routing them to the right team with a 98% deflection rate. Building on that success, the city put 'Alli,' its L1 IT Service Desk AI Specialist, into production. Where Ral-E guides and routes, Alli resolves complete workflows--handling common requests from start to finish using the city's knowledge base, historical incident data, and remediation workflows. Help desk staff oversee Alli's work and keep the knowledge she learns accurate and current. With the help of Ral-E and Alli, key outcomes include: -- 66% lower IT service desk costs achieved by redirecting staff time -- 98% of AI-generated incident summaries accepted as-is -- Nearly half of IT support requests resolved autonomously, with the city targeting 85% -- 98% of tickets routed correctly on first contact -- 20+ workflows automated through ServiceNow's Autonomous Workforce What's next: bringing the same experience to residents Raleigh is now extending its ServiceNow model beyond city hall. Ral-E and Alli will soon connect to the "Ask Raleigh" resident portal, helping nearly 500,000 residents get answers and complete service requests without ever picking up the phone--and giving city staff more time for the residents who need a person on the other end. Comments on the news: "Our residents expect their city to keep pace with their lives, and our employees deserve tools that make that possible," said Mark Wittenburg, chief information officer, City of Raleigh. "We're introd