Every customer service journey now begins the same way. A little window pops up in the corner. It has a friendly name, usually Max. It has a cartoon face. It says, “Hi! I’m here to help!” It is not here to help. It is here to stand between you and a human, like a bouncer made of FAQs, paid for out of the salaries of the twelve people it replaced.
Surveys say most people would now rather talk to a human. I’d go further. I’d rather talk to a human I owe money to. At least they want something from me. Below are the nine stages every customer passes through, one for each “speak to an agent”, and one for each year it takes off your life.
Stage 1: Optimism
You type a clear, detailed explanation. Order number. Date. What went wrong. You even say please, as your mother taught you, for situations exactly unlike this one. Max replies, “I see you’re asking about your order! Here’s how to track a parcel.” Your parcel was delivered. Broken. You said “broken” three times. Max picked out the word “order” like a dog hearing “walk”.
Stage 2: Patience
“Speak to an agent.” Max says, “I can help with that! First, could you tell me what your issue is?” You tell it again, shorter, like giving directions to a tourist who is also a toaster and also doesn’t care.
Stage 3: Bargaining
“Speak to an agent please.” You add please in case there’s a politeness threshold. There is not. There never was. Max offers five articles, including “How to Return an Item” and, inexplicably, “Our Commitment to Sustainability”, which is the only commitment this company has made since 2019.
Stage 4: Keyword Strategy
“AGENT.” Capitals. No verb. You are now speaking to Max the way you shout at a printer. Max says, “I understand you’d like to talk to someone! Before I connect you, was this article helpful?” You click No. Max says, “Thanks for your feedback!” and shows you the same article. Your feedback is logged and fed into the next version of Max, who will be worse.
Somewhere there was a human who could fix this in forty seconds. They were made redundant in 2023. Max was trained on their emails.
Stage 5: Thesaurus
You try new words. “Human.” “Real person.” “Representative.” “Operator.” “Anyone with a pulse.” “I’d like to complain about you to your manager.” Max says it doesn’t have a manager, which is the first true thing it has said, and for a moment you envy it. Nobody is tracking Max’s badge swipes.
Stage 6: Deception
You select “I’d like to cancel my account”, in the hope that someone, somewhere, is paid to stop people leaving. It works instantly. A human named Denise appears in eight seconds. Denise is lovely. Denise cannot help with broken parcels. Denise only does cancellations. The company has exactly one human left, and they’ve stationed her at the exit. Denise transfers you back to Max.
Stage 7: Acceptance (False)
“Speak to an agent.” You type it calmly now, like a monk who has stopped expecting anything from anyone. Max says the wait time is “approximately 4 minutes”. Twenty minutes later, it is still approximately 4 minutes. “Approximately” is doing heroic work. So is your blood pressure.
Stage 8: Rage, But Polite
“Speak to an agent.” You don’t swear. You type with such force that the laptop moves half a centimetre across the table. Max says, “I sense you may be frustrated!” Max senses correctly. Max then asks you to rate your experience out of five. It is the first time anyone has asked how you feel this year.
Stage 9: The Human
“Speak to an agent.” And then: “Hi, I’m Priya. I can see your parcel arrived damaged. I’ve sent a replacement and refunded the postage. Anything else?” Forty seconds. That’s all it ever needed. Forty seconds and a human.
You are so stunned that you say, “Oh. No. Thank you. Sorry.” You apologise to Priya. You don’t know why. Priya says, “No worries! Before you go, would you like to rate Max?”
You give Max five stars. You don’t know why. The rating goes into a report. The report goes to the board. The board sees five stars and agrees Max is working beautifully. Priya’s contract ends in March.