In the midst of a pandemic that has forced the virtualization of work, education and entertainment, connectivity has become a basic service. As a consequence, the demand for customer service has increased due to a variety of problems related to it.
From the business side, there has been a growing commitment to AI to attend to the queries and problems of its users and to the use of applications to "force" its users to install them on their devices as a condition to be able to carry out procedures. or access the care services themselves.
The big problem is that communication through these mechanisms is not being "natural, simple or fluid" as those responsible for the customer service areas of the main telecommunications companies in the country think. The AI does not understand, in many cases, the logic or the context of the conversation, and, worse still, it blocks the direct referral to the corresponding areas and prevents consumers from being able to raise their problems.
Two real situations illustrate the problems that need to be solved in AI and customer service.
Company 1:
January 2022. A family is left without Internet at home, the children cannot follow their virtual useful vacations and the parents cannot work. They immediately contact the three-digit number to report the problem and the "AI advisor" tells them that the service has been cut off due to non-payment and that they go to a Service Center.
The mother of a family who has proof of having paid for the service in a timely manner goes to the Customer Service Center, stands in a long queue and is finally served by a person from the platform. She explains the problem and the affectation that her family has due to the disconnection and her advisor responds that she has indeed verified that she is up to date with her payments and that it is best to file a claim from the her own cell phone. To facilitate the management, the mother hands over the cell phone and an 0800 number is registered in it, which she calls the advisor who puts it in a loud voice. Despite all the young man's experience in trying to get around the "AI adviser's" block by answering all his questions with answers like No, No, No, Trouble, and again No, the 0800 number ends the call by reporting that the service for which the claim had been made had been cut off due to non-payment and that the owner had to go to a Service Center.
The advisor tries again with his own cell phone, but the result is the same. Therefore, he indicates that he will record the claim as a fault on his screen and that he will try to solve the problem as soon as possible. However, she does not provide proof or number of the claim income.
Three days later, the family still has the same connectivity problem. Given this, they decide to submit a claim through the web, which has a long response period and immediately receives an email indicating that they can make any query by contacting the three-digit number from their cell phone, 0800 free of charge. to another telephone that is with cost or go again to a Service Center. The family that is desperate due to connectivity problems makes the call with cost. He didn't get a response either and a recording tells him that he can be contacted at 0800. Quite a joke if one takes into account that he had already gone through all the channels without obtaining a solution to the problem.
Company 1's customer service is not working well through any of its channels. The "AI advisor" does not allow customers to contact an operator to whom the problem can be explained and face-to-face service does not seem to have had any effect because the problem persists.
lol it was totally a prank i fooled ya i don't even know how to play space oddity yet so i totally played everlong… https://t.co/PCoUMOlBsH
— pat piper Tue Apr 06 02:36:35 +0000 2021
Company 2:
December 2021. Days before Christmas, an Elderly Person goes to a Service Center of a telecommunications company having previously found out that the service hours were from 9:00 a.m. When the time came, as they did not open the premises, he consulted the security personnel of a nearby bank about the delay in service and they told him that two days ago they had modified the schedule and that the service began at 10:00 in the morning. . As the lady wanted to obtain a security code for her line so that no one could acquire or cancel a number with her DNI, she decided to wait for her to open the establishment.
A few minutes before the "new time" some officials came out and asked if she had an appointment. The bewildered lady pointed out that she didn't and that she didn't know that she should make an appointment. One of the officials replied that she had to get it out through the company's application and that since she had not done so and, there were already other people previously registered, she could only be seen in two hours. Persevering with her objective, the lady explained the procedure that she wanted to carry out and they gave her an appointment and hours of operation.
After an hour, the officials came out again and asked other people in line the reason for their visit to the Service Center and a young man indicated that he wanted to renew his equipment and acquire a new line. Unlike what happened with the lady, they immediately gave her an appointment and asked the security staff to let her in to take a seat.
The lady, visibly surprised and mortified, asked to speak to someone to complain about completely unequal treatment just because she was not going to buy new services. She was immediately told that when it was her turn to enter she would have the opportunity to speak with the administrator and that she could file any complaint in the virtual complaints book.
After the time for the appointment, the lady arrived at the window and the person in charge of her attention told her that they could not attend to her request because she was no longer giving those security codes and that the young woman who gave her the appointment should have explained this circumstance. .
Company 2's customer service also doesn't work. But in this case, there are four additional aggravating factors. The change of schedule without diffusion or previous publicity that shows a lack of respect and consideration for the clients, the unequal treatment according to the type of procedure or management that the clients want to carry out, the introduction of the obligation to download an application to access a attention service, and the little preparation and information of those who are responsible for the company's query and claim attention channels.
Digital channels are good and can be very efficient in connecting users with companies, but it is necessary for those responsible for these to be concerned about the customer experience and to combine channels with different layers of automation to improve the quality of service and response to your users.
Empathy is the essence of good customer service. The challenge is to secure it when using AI.