The key difference between attended vs. unattended bots is this: Attended bots must be activated by employees while unattended bots operate on a preset schedule free of human interaction.
Here’s some more detail to help explain:
Attended robotic process automation works alongside employees directly on their computer, similar to a virtual assistant. It optimizes their repetitive tasks, increases their productivity, and improves their quality of work by providing real-time guidance and automated activities. However, the attended bot must complete each task before an employee can move on to any other activity.
An example of attended RPA is when a customer service specialist activates a bot to execute an address change request in a matter of seconds instead of making the updates manually, which could involve a number of steps and clicks.
Unattended RPA bots execute batch operations (a complex set of tasks) that do not require human interaction. They typically operate on a preset schedule or as triggered by logic programming (e.g., a predetermined set of facts and rules).
For example, an unattended bot can follow a predetermined workflow to identify vendor invoices sent via email, read those particular emails, store the attached invoices on the local system and prepare them for payment. Unattended bots can carry out this type of work around the clock.