I’m not sure there will be a difference either way. Customer service jobs spent decades trying to train humans to act as much as robots as possible. Of course replacing them with a shitty bot seemed to make sense, they were already pretending to be shitty bots.
Any “quality” in customer support comes from individuals circumventing company rules to provide actual support to the customer. AI can’t do that.You’re right, absolutely spot on, about several things but ONE IN PARTICULAR is this:
A human being helping a customer is, quite literally, an act of circumvention. Customer service EXISTS, SPECIFICALLY, for scenarios that require exceptions and skilled, knowledgeable internal maneuvering within, between, and around the cold mechanisms of machinery and policy. We tend to think of, say, purchasing items at a store as standard operation, for instance. But really, from the perspective of the business, its objective is to RESTRICT access to goods and services. The cashier manages exceptions to this goal. If the company has its way, it would take your money while relinquishing NOTHING.
I do not agree with the idea that humans are being trained to act like robots. Any company with a customer service department is likely tracking the root causes of their customers’ issues. With enough data, they can identify the most common problems and their solutions. If the goal is to resolve a customer’s issue as quickly as possible (which seems like a reasonable assumption), it makes sense to guide the customer through the most common solutions first, as that will likely solve the problem.
If someone works in customer service and repeats the same script daily, it’s understandable that they may come across as robotic due to sheer boredom. A skilled customer service representative can recognize when to use the script and when to deviate. However, if a company fails to hire the right people and does not offer a fair salary, those best suited for the role are unlikely to take the job.
My wife is a customer service manager/trainer. Hiring actually competent people who know how to just listen to the customer and understand their needs is apparently really fucking hard. I’ve heard some stories of such dumbfuckery…
And once they are in, HR/lawyers make it so fucking hard to fire anyone. If you get a decent customer service person, either as an employer or customer, appreciate them.
I don’t even know what Klarna does and don’t care to look it up. They bought an app that I used to use for managing loyalty cards. Before Klarna bought them, the app would pop the loyalty card into my notifications as soon as I entered the store. When is time to check out the card was right there waiting for me.
After Klarna bought them, the convenient auto-notification went away. Then you’d load up the app and it takes you to a default home page with “Try X”, “Special discount on Y, this week only” posted everywhere and none of it related to the store I’m in. The loyalty cards were buried somewhere I had to go find.
So I deleted the app and just use Google Wallet for my loyalty cards. Still no convenient auto notification with the card for the store I’m in, but Wallet is ready enough to get to and isn’t plastered with ads.
AI support is equivalent to an interactive and searchable FAQ.
A FAQ that may have incorrect, often contradictory information.
And no one that has an option should take them up on those job offers.
They have shown what they will do again as soon as they think AI gets good enough.
