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If there’s one thing most Brits agree on, it’s that customer service has gone downhill in recent years.
While the pandemic was once the excuse for poor service, both the public and private sectors have continued to falter in recent years.
One area that has continued to receive a slap on the wrist from the regulator has been the mobile and broadband industry.
While overall complaints have decreased, some well-known names, including Vodafone, have come under fire for the high number of customer complaints.
Vodafone’s contact center in Stoke houses its customer service division
While challenger brands can adapt, it takes a lot of work to turn around legacy systems that haven’t kept pace with customer demand and changes in technology.
It is taking more time and money for companies to adopt technology that serves the customer well to begin making important changes.
Jon Shaw, Vodafone’s chief commercial officer, believes he is the right man for the job.
Having improved the company’s complaints performance, it is now turning its attention to how artificial intelligence could improve service.
We visited their Stoke contact center to see how they have adapted to complaints management and where the future of AI is heading.
How telcos ‘gained confidence too quickly’ with technology
A recent Ofcom report revealed that customers continue to struggle to contact an agent at telcos, while others say they have to make long and repeated requests to cancel.
Complaint management remains the biggest problem among mobile and broadband customers.
While Vodafone’s complaints are now well below the industry average, it would be remiss to ignore the problems that persist.
Shaw says telcos “got too safe too fast” and at Vodafone customers were forced to use chatbots for complicated queries before they were ready.
When he took over two years ago, he says he wanted to make it easier to talk to Vodafone representatives. It’s a simple change but one that has clearly been influenced by Shaw’s years in retail.
‘I wanted to create some processes to get better feedback from our frontline teams about what’s not working. “I also wanted to look into all the complaints.”
The approach has paid dividends for Vodafone, but broader customer services remain. Overreliance on technology that is often not up to par means that customers still have to wait for simple requests.
Shaw says this has led to “difficult conversations” at Vodafone: “Instead of relying on technology to solve the problem for the customer, being there for the customer… What are the things they tell us that don’t work? ?Then do something about it.
Why chatbots haven’t worked
What Shaw seems to bring is a uniquely human side to customer service.
Automation and bots have made customer service almost useless for many people… but when something goes seriously wrong, it’s clear that chatbots aren’t enough.
It has been inflicted on consumers in both the public and private sectors. In some cases it works well, but too often consumers have been left in the lurch without being able to talk to a human being.
“They’re good if it’s a really simple request, but I don’t think they’re on the level of Alexa and Siri, if you try to tell them more than several sentences.”
“Then it becomes distorted and confused. That’s why we reduced some of that.
“At the moment, if it’s not a really simple request, it will still end up in the hands of one of our qualified colleagues.”
Instead, Vodafone extended its call center opening hours to 10pm during the week to better fit people’s schedules.
Vodafone’s Jon Shaw hopes to improve customer service by implementing AI
‘Your kids are still awake, it’s too early to call… especially when I have a complicated matter. I need to talk to you, you need to be open.’
Call center staff dealing with “life events” such as bereavement receive training and are kept separate from other colleagues at its Stoke contact centre.
‘I know personally that many years ago, when I lost my mom and dad, the companies I will always speak fondly of are the ones that facilitated the grieving process and not the ones that wanted five copies of a birth certificate and sixteen different tests. .
‘They are making it more difficult at a difficult time. “We’ve tried to wrap our heads around what we’re doing in terms of when we should do it.”
It’s a noble pursuit but ultimately it comes down to brand perception and how it affects Vodafone’s bottom line.
“In the world we live in now, not just social media but communication in general, everyone tells everyone about their good and bad experiences with a brand right away, and that’s a very good reason to try do the right thing.”
Elsewhere, Shaw has redoubled Vodafone’s presence on the high street at a time when other companies are downsizing.
Shaw says it’s not just about older people: the reality is that most demographic groups use it, albeit for different reasons.
The stores have become so important that in the Vodafone contact center there is a mock-up of the store to show staff how it really works.
Could AI be the solution to improve service?
Despite bolstering its high street presence, technology remains at the forefront of Shaw’s approach to improving customer service.
‘At Vodafone, we’ve been working on how to make AI useful to our customers and colleagues. “We don’t see AI as replacing our people, we see it as an enhancement of our people.”
It is a line that has been used by most companies looking to reduce staff in the future, but Shaw insists it is about helping colleagues.
‘Suppose you call the call center, the AI is almost like an assistant to our agent, helping him to correctly diagnose what is wrong.
‘Suppose you really have problems with the signal, the voice drops out, the AI will help them diagnose faster: what is the solution, is there some setting on your phone that they need to change, is there something in the local area. He will look for it and he will do it.
‘We don’t see it as bright, AI is coming and it will make us more efficient, could it reduce our costs? We see it the opposite: our colleagues will be even better from the customer’s point of view.’
Are staff excited about the prospect?
Speaking to Vodafone contact center staff suggests there really are ways it could work.
In particular, staff at its ‘SOS’ center at the heart of the operations said it would make their lives much easier.
Shaw says, “How we’ve explained it to them and the prototypes they’ve seen and the systems they’re using so far, they’re less afraid now that they’ve seen it more.”
“When we first told them we were looking at fragments, they said, ‘What does this mean for us? I can see where this is going.'”
Shaw is a breath of fresh air in what has become one of the worst parts of dealing with a company in modern Britain.
However, it seems too early to say whether AI will be a real solution to these problems and could lead to a further invasion of chatbots into our lives. Exactly the opposite of what the British ask for.
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