Automation - "Domo Arigato"

We use automation every day, from grocery shopping to entertainment systems. We rely on algorithms and automatic processing more than we realise, and unless it goes wrong we rarely notice it.At QuayTech we've been looking at ways we can automate certain tasks to improve customer service and free up team members from repetitive tasks, but there is a stigma behind automation.How Automation can Supercharge Customer ServiceHumans are... well, human. A human can't check a mail box 60 times a minute, and a human can't reply to an email in less than a second. An algorithm can. When it comes to automatic replies, nearly every support team on the planet has one. Everyone knows it's an automatic email of course, but getting a quick response can turn a satisfied customer into a happy customer. Why not take it a step further?It can take hours for the human brain to detect patterns (and anomalies) but a bot can do this instantly. A simple alert to an engineer's phone that says "6 clients have had the same problem with this software in the last hour" means you can have a problem resolved in minutes and hours, not days.Communication between departments is a struggle for every growing business, but why not run an automatic notification to relay information from one team to another? In a software company, passing a ticket from development to QA automatically can drastically shorten the ticket life cycle. And no chasing other teams!In the age of AI, self driving cars, and computer landed rocket ships, holding on to past processes can leave your business behind the market.But is it all good? When Automation Goes too FarRobots are... well, robots. You can't replace the human response with a line of code, and ultimately customers will always appreciate personal treatment. To that effect, an automatic reply to an email is good customer service, but only if it's followed up later but a real human response. It's also probably not a good idea to try and get your bot to draft it's own responses like Asos did back in 2016 (Trust me - https://tinyurl.com/y936eb66) Like most things, moderation is key, and unless you can reduce time spent or increase customer satisfaction, sticking with the human route is probably best. When you can though, automation could make a world of difference to your customer service team.