AI Won't Fix the Real Issue With Customer Service

The priority should be to enhance human connection, not replace it.

- Anjli Raval

How many times do you call a customer service help desk before reaching breaking point? I came close when trying to arrange an internet connection for my new home earlier in 2025.

Each time we booked an installation, we subsequently received an automated text message postponing our appointment. The process was repeated over weeks in an infuriating doom loop.

"I don't see this in our records," one call centre adviser said over and over again in a scripted response. All I craved was a human reaction acknowledging my frustration. Instead, I was asked to fill out a satisfaction survey.

Customer service is often so awful that it's hard not to think that artificial intelligence (AI) tools will make it better—from faster responses and tailored feedback to predictive analytics and smart routing. But I'm not sure how much of a panacea it will be.

AI is taking hold in this space partly because so many of these processes have been dehumanised. It is patching over a problem technology itself helped create.

Ms Belinda Parmar, chief executive of corporate advisory company The Empathy Business, says AI is helping to fix a "broken system" created by cost-cutting, automation and an obsession with efficiency.