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I was on hold today, for what seemed like an eternity. What is the reason for the general decrease in the quality of phone customer service queues? Population increase? Cost savings? Complete lack of empathy? All of the above?

I’ll leave it to the business and psychology experts to take up that debate. In fact, much has been and continues to be written on the subject. What I have been pondering is the communication aspect of the whole process. I daresay that most of us would rather speak to a human than a machine. And most of us probably have a problem that is more complicated than those menu choices – even at the fourth level down. It’s not all about time and impatience – although those are more pressing than ever in our culture today.

No, we need confirmation and understanding. Resolution and closure. None of that is very satisfying – if it is even possible – with recordings and voice capture. All of this presupposes at least two things: 1) that the human on the other end is competent, and 2) that he or she has the authority to help you, not read through a script until you reach an impasse and then pass you along to the next person. Those are two huge hurdles.

So much lip service is spent these days on “excellent customer service,” but it has become an endangered species. A few organizations pride themselves on connecting you to a live person straight away. But you are usually paying for that through special fees. Some offer calls back if the queue is too long. But the bottom line is the bottom line. Trained humans are expensive. Online chat is one solution offered by many. But it’s pretty clear that this usually allows the agents to multi-task with several chats at once – what else could cause those long pauses? At least it is a form of human-to-human interaction.

My problem is that I am a complainer from way back. And I’m always sure that my issue is much more complex than the average. I have this foolish notion that, if I can just get to a real person, my logic and persuasive argument will win the day. What a pipe dream!

It will be interesting to see if this problem gets addressed through further technology, or if we will just become accustomed to it, like we have so many other things. Remember the boiling frog?