The vanishing human in customer care

As companies race to automate customer support, speaking to a real person has become a luxury—sometimes even a paid one

- Shephali Bhatt [e-mail]

When was the last time you tried calling customer care? Was it hard just to locate 'customer support’ on the brand’s app or site? Did you have to jump through hoops just to get the option to speak to an agent? Select random issues because yours wasn’t on the list? Click through so many automated menus that by the time you reached someone, you had forgotten how you got there, to make the process less painful the next time around? And when you did succeed, were you frustrated even further because it wasn’t a human agent but an AI voicebot you spoke to on the call? Welcome to customer service in 2025.

It’s a routine Yash Bhardwaj knows all too well. The 27-year-old tech entrepreneur from Mumbai regularly finds himself in this maze with hyperlocal delivery apps. "I probably have to pick 3-4 false issues for some kind of 'talk to agent' option to even appear."

His recent encounter with Uber's customer care system, however, made food delivery apps seem efficient in comparison. “I took an Uber rickshaw ride and paid via card, but the driver said he hadn’t received the money. I opened a ticket through the app, but it had a very AI response. Nobody got back to me, and I couldn't find a way to contact them,” Bhardwaj says. The only feature designed to draw immediate attention was the SOS button, but his issue, he felt, fell more in the “annoying” category. Ironically, even the SOS button doesn’t connect you straight to a person. It leads you through multiple prompts, sharing your live location with authorities and offering options to either call the police or connect with a support agent on the safety line.

HOW DID WE GET HERE?