They would just find a way to outsource that to the cheapest possible source. And ensure that the human is not empowered to do anything for you that's useful. Platitudes as a service..."We're sorry this happened to you. Have your tried rebooting?".
Tell HN: There needs to be a “right to speak with a human”
41–50 of 348 posts
Re: Tell HN: There needs to be a “right to speak with a human”
#42I was in an airport terminal where all of the restaurants and cafes had tables with iPads. I went to one of the restaurants and ordered a burger using one of them. From what I remember I was the only patron there.
About 40 minutes later, I'm looking at the waiter walking around and it didn't seem like he was waiting on any food from the kitchen. He also didn't come over once, and probably assumed that I was just hanging out and watching the US Open on the TVs.
I flagged him over and it turned out that my order did not go through at all. I then spent another 15 minutes waiting on my food to actually arrive.
If I'd spoken to a human from the beginning, this probably wouldn't have happened.
The burger wasn't that good, anyway.
Re: Tell HN: There needs to be a “right to speak with a human”
#43I agree. You mentioned email, but to me the main issue is when one calls a support number. I absolutely despise calling a customer support number and having to listen to the "automated" response that gives one menu options that one navigates via numbers on the telephone (it's only automated for them, not the for the end-user, who has to manually chug through this process, with menu items that don't even necessarily c…
And (in Australia anyway) you have to listen to a machine say "This call may be monitored for quality" - but they don't "monitor" the awful 5-45 minutes of waiting, then pressing buttons, more waiting etc to eventually get through to a real person – the low quality half of the call, from the customer's perspective. I hate that.
Re: Tell HN: There needs to be a “right to speak with a human”
#44I understand that companies get a lot of call volume around incredibly basic stuff, you can hear it in their menu design, but in the last ~10 calls I've made for support 1) I had to because the online ticket/chat option went nowhere and 2) the phone support was a several hour ordeal that usually went nowhere but in a few instances I got what I needed.
I don't know what the solution is but it's unfortunate that the 95% who can't read their monthly statement have ruined the first 3 menu pages on phone systems and now no one wants to pay humans for the very real edge cases.
Re: Tell HN: There needs to be a “right to speak with a human”
#45How much would you pay for that right?
The whole thing about rights is that you do not have to pay for them. If I have a right to vote, you cannot justify doing something that denies me the option to vote by claiming it is worth something to me.
I am principally concerned here with the actions of organizations that create problems for third parties, such as when their actions, or failure to act, facilitate fraud against people who are not their customers.
Re: Tell HN: There needs to be a “right to speak with a human”
#46This week we had a disgruntled employee leave a 1-star Google review of our shop. They have never been a customer... I reported it as a Conflict of Interest PER GOOGLE'S OWN STATED POLICY and it was rejected almost immediately. Google could find nothing wrong with the review. We have no recourse to escalate. No way to even interact with a human about it. It's absolutely ridiculous. I have plenty of documentation and…
Got to say the fact that you thought someone leaving a 1 star review on a service you don't own, google, was worth you escalating it to a real person tells me these companies are doing the right thing. And shaming the CEOs when you made the choice to use their product is a bit silly and you come off as entitled, not righteous.
How do we or google know if he was disgruntled vs fired, how do we know if he didn't come in as a customer after he was fired and was treated like shit?
I'm imagining the situation where in your world where every business who got a bad review would be calling google. Imagine the number of bullshit calls they would get? And how much all of us would have to pay to support that?
If you want a real person to help you, pay for it. Plenty of companies are willing to sell you a service contract, even google, if you're willing to pay.
Vote with your dollars (even if the original poster preemptively tried to say why that won't work ... it's the ONLY thing that ever has in my experience)
Re: Tell HN: There needs to be a “right to speak with a human”
#47For those in the know, do platforms like Twilio make it any easier to select some standard template that should make this more common? Like, assuming they have reps to begin with, does something like Twilio make doing the right thing easier or harder?
Re: Tell HN: There needs to be a “right to speak with a human”
#48I bought a sump pump, and called their number to ask some question. 30 seconds and one menu option later I was speaking with someone who clearly had a lot of technical knowledge of the sump pump. I was very pleasantly surprised since I am used to expect no human interaction and if I get a human on the call, it would be someone who can only provide "common sense" level of support. I wish this were the case for more companies.
Re: Tell HN: There needs to be a “right to speak with a human”
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
The sheer cardinality of ways they mess it up is impressive. 1. Long intro message with hours, location, website intro, email address and to hang up and call 911 if it’s an emergency 2. “Our menu items have recently changed” years after changing them 3. “We are currently experiencing higher than normal call volume” 100% of the time 4. No “other” option 5. Listing options 2, 3, 4, 5 and then the most common option “1,…
The worst is when they won't accept new calls in queue, and just hang up.
Aflac has recently (past year) 100% stopped their phone support. Calling their phone support tells you to log in to their website.
I hope you don't have trouble with their website!
I was able to get my issue sort-of resolved by making a complaint to a regulator -- I now have a direct line to someone capable of taking my phone call. But that's not an option for every company.
Re: Tell HN: There needs to be a “right to speak with a human”
#50This week we had a disgruntled employee leave a 1-star Google review of our shop. They have never been a customer... I reported it as a Conflict of Interest PER GOOGLE'S OWN STATED POLICY and it was rejected almost immediately. Google could find nothing wrong with the review. We have no recourse to escalate. No way to even interact with a human about it. It's absolutely ridiculous. I have plenty of documentation and…
Are the criticisms accurate? That should be the main concern. This is a free speech country after all.