Agreed. In typical fashion engineers try to solve non-technical problems with more technology. Sure, there are cases where a chat bot could replace a human or

Agreed. In typical fashion engineers try to solve non-technical problems with more technology. Sure, there are cases where a chat bot could replace a human or a well-written FAQ. But this navel-gazing overlooks the main reason support is so dreadful: because it’s designed to be. Just take “call to cancel” as an example, and compare that to signing up or upselling which is technically more difficult problems. The point is to add friction for anything perceived as a short-term cost or loss. They know that a lot of people will give up or defer anything with friction. It’s the paradigm of nudging, or dark patterns. Look at eg the cookie banners, and how “reject all” is buried in most cases. Nudging allows a company to be compliant with the law, but evade the effect of it in aggregate, at the cost of your time and attention. Chat bots is just another layer in the support maze.