In 2008, I remember calling Comcast and taking hours of elevator music to get human support.
Today, I get ai support which fails to resolve my problem until a human steps in.
ai support is the new elevator music
Ask HN: Will low quality AI customer support be the new normal?
31–40 of 43 posts
Re: Ask HN: Will low quality AI customer support be the new normal?
#32[flagged]
Re: Ask HN: Will low quality AI customer support be the new normal?
#33Now whenever I reach for customer's support chat or phone
There are commercial lists of people who have histories of using customer support.
Companies use them to determine economically rational levels of resources to commit when servicing customers.
Re: Ask HN: Will low quality AI customer support be the new normal?
#34The real fun one is calling the utility company to report a downed line from a pole snapped in half and the bot agent doesn’t transfer you to a human even when you say “emergency”, “public hazard”, “utility pole obstructing a roadway”, “potential property damage your corporation will be liable for”, “immenient danger to life and limb” or any and all applicable keyword variations that might warrant humanly answering (…
Point taken, but you should call emergency services if the threat is acute. They will obtain a faster response from the utility if needed.
Re: Ask HN: Will low quality AI customer support be the new normal?
#35I believe it will, indeed, become the new standard as it’s too cost efficient for the companies but they may loose a lot of people that are not tech savvy on the way (e.g. older people). This will either drive their customers to competitors properly managing support or force the companies to revisit the way they handle support.
Re: Ask HN: Will low quality AI customer support be the new normal?
#36The meta has certainly shifted.
At $PREVIOUS_EMPLOYER, they prided themselves on having the best support operators, with deep technical prowess of their specific knowledge domain. Their L1 were better than some other business' L3s infrastructure specialists. This lasted for more than a decade, right until a merger with another business that also had their own human support department and certain "strategic opportunities" were identified. At first, some operations were consolidated, and some people were fired. Once the corporate machine saw the numbers, they just kept going. Nowadays, its almost full AI.
Re: Ask HN: Will low quality AI customer support be the new normal?
#37I think it will be, but only for sometime. As the AI improves, the process also will improve and adapt overtime. And hopefully support will be much more smarter and easier and not low quality..
Re: Ask HN: Will low quality AI customer support be the new normal?
#38[flagged]
Re: Ask HN: Will low quality AI customer support be the new normal?
#39Yes. Because, the incentives for companies are too big to ignore. The math being done right now is $10/hr for voice support in (say) the Phillipines is much more than $0.10/hr having an AI do it, even factoring in the cost of some customer churn. And the risk of the latter for some services can be discounted to zero if the user has no viable alternative. Second, the best support line is one where no one calls in. So…
> if the user has no viable alternative. There's always a viable alternative. But not for customers who are always looking for the cheapest viable products or services. So those customers will spend too much time and frustration with bad customer service, because they think it's outrageous to consider a competitor who is a little bit more expensive.
> There's always a viable alternative
Tell that to my insurance provider, the only insurance provider I am allowed to choose by my employer.
Or my doctor's office, the only doctors office that treats my ailment that my insurance provider calls in their network. They use AI customer support. They just fired 80% of their receptionists and replaced them with kiosks.
Or my pharmacy, where I get a choice of 3 whole local/mail-in pharmacies I can go to, but each one of them uses AI customer support.
I would consider anyone who's more expensive, if I were allowed to pay for it. Most of the time there is no options. I'm seeking a new employer in the hopes that some other insurance network will be better, but this seems to be the direction that all things are going: full corporate cartels squeezing the life out of everyone.
Re: Ask HN: Will low quality AI customer support be the new normal?
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
> if the user has no viable alternative. There's always a viable alternative. But not for customers who are always looking for the cheapest viable products or services. So those customers will spend too much time and frustration with bad customer service, because they think it's outrageous to consider a competitor who is a little bit more expensive.
> There's always a viable alternative Tell that to my insurance provider, the only insurance provider I am allowed to choose by my employer. Or my doctor's office, the only doctors office that treats my ailment that my insurance provider calls in their network. They use AI customer support. They just fired 80% of their receptionists and replaced them with kiosks. Or my pharmacy, where I get a choice of 3 whole local/…
> the only insurance provider I am allowed to choose by my employer.
What? Do you mean the only insurance provider your employer will give you for free, or do you mean your employer can control your contracts with other parties? Are you in prison or on a slave plantation?