alt Hacker NewsWhen will these companies realize nobody wants to talk to an AI? The reason we begrudgingly pick up the phone is because some problem is not solvable through the website. The last thing we want at that point is an automated system parroting the website back to us, or telling us to go there ourselves
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Some percentage of telephone service, service chat etc. is stuff that could be easily found via the website, I know 98% of the time when I call it is just not possible to resolve through reading the documentation on someone's site (the last 2% it is, but the site sucks so much I don't want to try) and I'm sure it's the same for you and probably for most of HN, but having worked at a help and documentation service for a major telephony provider in Denmark I do know there are statistics that in fact show most of the stuff could be found on the site, people just don't want to take the time.
At that point the main problem for a service is to figure out when they are dealing with someone who could solve the problem through the website, and when they are dealing with someone whose problem is too complicated to be solved that way. Although it also seems like many people don't want to spend the money on doing that analysis and serving their customers, as you have pointed out.
I guess if you see customer service as a checkbox you have to have, and also a cost center skimming from your bottom line, you will do whatever to make it as cheap and hostile as possible.
They don't care.
Support call center is operation cost. They did they math and think this will save them more money than losing a few angry or disappointed customer.