Do Your Automated Communication Channels Help or Hurt Your Business?

Forbes first published my article here .

Are you tired of talking to chatbots? While such AI uses may be a boon to the productivity of your internal team, it’s likely destroying confidence among your customers. In fact, it may be such an irritant that they stop doing business with you altogether.

This week alone I’ve had three annoying “interactions” with chatbots—interactions that wasted hours of my time and put my “nerves” on edge.

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Is Your AI Communication Destroying IQ, EQ, ROI, and Your Customer Base?

Over the weekend, I succumbed to a super salesperson, signed on the dotted line, and agreed to finance a mattress at 0% interest for a year. (I figured it would not be as convenient as just paying cash, but hey, for customers who agreed to finance, they also offered a $200 price discount and a $300 gift certificate. Little did I know the time cost!) Their finance bank sent an alert to say they couldn’t approve the financing until I removed the “freeze” from my credit account.

Easy.? I go online, “unlock” (remove the freeze) my account. Then I call the finance company to say I am all set—freeze removed.

But not so fast. The finance rep checks, and reports to me that the account is still locked.

So I call the Experian 800 and get a bot, which leads me through their voice response system to “unfreeze” my account (which I had already done a half-hour earlier directly on the site, but going through the process again was the only choice the bot gave me).

The bot congratulates me, saying my account is now successfully unlocked. A few seconds later, an auto-responder sends me a “congratulations” email, saying I’ve successfully unlocked my account.

I call the finance company back to say again, “I’m all set, with freeze removed.” The finance company rep, talking to a bot, reports for the second time that my account still has a freeze/lock.

I appeal to the salesperson for help, telling her I’ve unlocked it twice—by voice response and also directly on the website.

She says, “I’m sorry. I’ve tried to get to a real person as well. No luck. Only a bot saying the account is still locked. So I have no idea what’s wrong.”

Deciding that beating my head against a wall with a different store, ?technology, and bot would be equally challenging, I decide to give it a third try. I call the bot back, and try to explain that I need to talk with a human to tell them that their AI routing has failed them.

No luck. No matter how many times I select different options and? yell “Agent” at the bot, she merely tells me “Goodbye” and hangs up.

Mysteriously, the bot monitoring my financing account texts me to say that “all is well.” The account is finally unlocked, and I can proceed with scheduling delivery.

You guessed it: An automated bot led me through their voice response system to schedule the delivery the next day. Only 6 hours wasted for the total “communication” process.

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The Second Interaction with a Bot at the IRS

Moving further down my to-do list: Check with the IRS to see why my 2019 tax refund still hasn’t arrived (after months of IRS letters saying their agents need “another 60 days” to determine the refund is correct).

But thank goodness, I was able to talk to a live IRS agent after only a 53-minute wait. I had 5 specific questions. She could answer none.

But she was “happy” to provide 5 different 800 numbers , where I could get in line again to speak to more bots.

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The Third Attempt to Break Through the Communication Barrier

My credit card company sent a letter saying customers must go to a specific URL to accept their new “Terms & Conditions.” If not done, the letter threatened, “Your credit cards may become invalid.”

Upon logging in at the specified URL, I got this message: “Sorry, our website is having issues. Please check back later.”

Over the next month, I checked in every 2-3 days. Same message.

After 45 days, I finally found a phone number to report the ongoing problem. The “live” human responded: “Sorry, but we can’t help you with that task on the phone. You’ll need to use the ‘Chat With Us’ feature on the website.”

I explained that their chatbot did not appear at the bottom of the referenced page. She promised to escalate the issue. Today, 75 days later, no fix. The website still says, “Chat With Us.”? Clicking the button to chat produces the same loop. “Oops, the website has issues. Please check back later to chat with us.”

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The Fourth Attempt to Break Through as a Customer: Healthcare Duplicity and Duplication

Recently, about 10 days before my mom’s scheduled doctor’s appointment, I had to cancel. ?The human at the doctor’s office took my call and cancelled the appointment.

Three days before the cancelled visit, I receive a “confirmation” of the upcoming visit. I phone the doctor’s office to verify the cancellation: “Oh, no problem,” she says. “It’s cancelled in my records. Just ignore those auto-reminders. Once an appointment is set, those alerts just have a mind of their own. Just ignore them in the future.”

Really?

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How to Remove the Customer Communication Barriers and Stop Driving Your Customers Insane

The more chatbots created, the more hostile your customers will likely become. If you want to improve the communication, consider the following:

• Always add a “something else” option on your automated phone menus. Every customer doesn’t have a “routine” issue or problem to solve.
• Make sure 800 numbers go to the appropriate departments. Avoid looping 800s so that your customers don’t end up at their starting point (the first 800).
• Program auto-responders to sync with real human actions/stop actions.
• Give callers some option to speak to a human—even if they have to go through a hellish procedure to reach a live one.
• Perfect the bot’s manners and tone. Hanging up abruptly on customers does not endear them to your company.

After all, you work hard to snag new customers. ?Why alienate them when they’d like to communicate with you?

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Make sure your emails don’t read like a chatbot wrote them with Faster, Fewer, Better Emails

Dianna?Booher?is the bestselling author of 50 books, published in 62 foreign-language editions. She helps organizations to communicate clearly and leaders to expand their influence by a strong executive presence—and often by their own published book. Her latest books include?Faster, Fewer, Better Emails;?Communicate Like a Leader;?What MORE Can I Say?;?Creating Personal Presence; and?Communicate With Confidence. National Media such as Good Morning America,?USA Today, The Wall Street Journal,?Bloomberg, Forbes, FOX, CNN, NPR, and?Entrepreneur?have interviewed her for opinions on workplace communication issues. www.BooherResearch.com @DiannaBooher