Vodafone chatbot timing out while waiting for VF staff to reply

Forums › One New Zealand (including Vodafone, WxC, Farmside) › Vodafone chatbot timing out while waiting for VF staff to reply

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quickymart

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#2943070 17-Jul-2022 10:55

Speaking of Vodafone customer service and chatbots - they get a mention here: https://www.stuff.co.nz/opinion/129282574/jehan-casinader-whats-happened-to-customer-service

rugrat

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#2943143 17-Jul-2022 12:39

quickymart:

Speaking of Vodafone customer service and chatbots - they get a mention here: https://www.stuff.co.nz/opinion/129282574/jehan-casinader-whats-happened-to-customer-service

I was missing some items in a Countdown order, used their chatbot was able to give it the missing items, said it would forward email on for people to check it out. Day or two latter money was refunded to credit card.

Did have to tell it twice though as it just gave a non helpful answer first time, can’t remember if I worded it slightly different second time, but after saying items missing from order second time, it then went on to asking details of missing items.

I guess if chat bot is bad is on how it is set up and how flexible wording has to be for it to help, and not just give a check web site here or some other unhelpful answer.

Ended up with problem solved without direct human interaction with the above.

I don’t know if Vodafone has more success stories then bad ones, as people that get good service usually don’t say anything. I did ring about Vodafone TV once, was passed around for about half hour before finally speaking to right person. The call centre staff gave me the impression they were doing their best. Seems everything is heavily departmentalised there.

rugrat

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#2943161 17-Jul-2022 14:04

Compartmentalised was the word should’ve used in above post.

morphyoss

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#2943180 17-Jul-2022 15:30

Well, I just had a hilarious issue. I used the chatbot to talk to 'a human' to ask if they could better the deal we currently have with 2 degrees for broadband and two mobile connections.

It fell over at the first hurdle, as they couldnt locate my address which is in Christchurch City and we are clearly currently connected to enable fibre via 2 degrees.

I got passed to three different agents, all of which obviously were not able to see the history of the prior chat. And was asked to start over each time.

And this is for a sales query!

Its a shame, because i'm looking for a 12month deal - and they have probably missed out. Though i did leave my mobile for them to call me if they suddenly figure out they can offer services to our address like every other provider in NZ can.

cokemaster

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#2943230 17-Jul-2022 19:58

I must echo's @rugrat's experience with the countdown 'bot'. I too had some missing items and it was a breeze to go through the flow... with a credit being issued a day later.

Having been in the room sometimes, I think a lot of service-oriented companies look at bots as cost cutting tools - eg. being able to deflect calls from contact centres or being able to reduce contact centre availability. The problem is that most of the bots that I've seen, have no meaningful-defined 'process flows' (eg. like the refund on countdown), don't integrate with your information/profile and are basically interactive google searches of the providers FAQ/products pages.

It is entirely possible that they do serve up the right answer... but I also wager that some chatbots make getting the right solution so difficult that some people just give up.

Fortunately most chatbots in NZ have a 'human please' process, but I've seen some on American websites where bot interaction is the only customer service they provide... and if you deviate from one of their journeys - good luck.

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