I've long contended that most customer hotlines and online help tools are not there for the benefit of the consumer. Instead, they are barriers used to ward off pesky customers who take up a company's time.
Today's New York Times carries a piece on Netflix and their decision to have all queries go to a call center where they reach a live person. (Link to full article, registration required.)
Ms. Funk is one of 200 customer service representatives at the Netflix call center here, 20 miles west of Portland, where she is on the front lines of the online movie rental company’s efforts to use customer service as a strategic weapon against Blockbuster’s similar DVD-mailing service.
If companies really wanted to help customers they would make it easier, not harder, to get help. This decision by Netflix is acknowledgement that customers prefer a voice, not automation. And I truly hope it works out for them and increases customer loyalty. (The topic of getting to a voice, through all the decision trees, is the subject of another discussion.)
I know there are those who have numbers proving how costly a call center can be but I truly believe that companies don't understand how they can increase customer loyalty by making all this easier and friendlier. (As an experiment, trying finding the customer service number on a company's Web site. In most cases you will find it buried.)
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