{"id":19000,"date":"2019-12-19T17:35:58","date_gmt":"2019-12-19T17:35:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=19000"},"modified":"2019-12-21T03:27:49","modified_gmt":"2019-12-21T03:27:49","slug":"why-bad-customer-service-wont-improve-anytime-soon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/why-bad-customer-service-wont-improve-anytime-soon\/","title":{"rendered":"Why bad customer service won’t improve anytime soon"},"content":{"rendered":"

Anthony Dukes<\/a>, University of Southern California<\/a><\/em> and Yi Zhu<\/a>, University of Minnesota<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Some of the most hated companies in the U.S. are also the most profitable<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Much of this consumer resentment may stem from poor customer service<\/a>. In fact, most Americans have fought with phone menus, desperately seeking a live service agent to seek a refund.<\/p>\n

In 2013, Americans spent an average of 13 hours<\/a> disputing a purchase or resolving a problem with customer service.<\/p>\n

As professors<\/a> of marketing<\/a>, we have examined why customer service continues to be so unsatisfactory even at many profitable companies.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Comcast customer Carmel Booth claimed to have received such bad service that she forced city officials to hold a public meeting about it.<\/span>
\nAP Images\/John Amis<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Is good customer service unattainable?<\/h2>\n

Our research<\/a> focuses on the structure and incentives of various customer service centers to explain why consumers perpetually experience hassles when seeking refunds.<\/p>\n

What we found is not encouraging.<\/p>\n

Many complaint processes are actually designed to help companies retain profits by limiting the number of customers<\/a> who can successfully resolve their complaints.<\/p>\n

The process involves a tiered structure in which all incoming inquiries start at \u201cLevel 1.\u201d Level 1 may be a call center operator who listens to a complaint but acknowledges that there is nothing he can do.<\/p>\n

Only by insisting to talk to a manager or threatening to leave the company do consumers come closer to obtaining a refund.<\/p>\n

Forcing customers to talk to a computer, circulate through phone menus or sit on hold \u201cwhile serving other customers\u201d serves the same deterring role as that Level 1 call-center agent.<\/p>\n

Saving money with smart tech<\/h2>\n

By design, Level 1 agents are limited in their authority<\/a> to compensate customers.<\/p>\n

For example, one Indian call center that we visited forbade Level 1 agents from offering any monetary refunds.<\/p>\n

Consumers may have noticed that companies\u2019 call centers increasingly use automated chatbots to serve as Level 1 \u201cagents.\u201d The caller can talk with a human agent \u2013 at Level 2 or even higher \u2013 only after the chatbot\u2019s AI technology recognizes that a customer is sufficiently unhappy with the process.<\/p>\n

These smart technologies determine the caller\u2019s level of anger by remotely monitoring the tone and pace of voice<\/a>. If the level of anger reflects a chance the customer may leave the company, then the call is transferred to a more experience operator to handle the complaint.<\/p>\n

This allows companies to exploit customers\u2019 individual differences in age, race and gender so that only the \u201csqueakiest wheels<\/a>\u201d are compensated.<\/p>\n