Customers: The rubber-stamp kings

The bane of conversational IVR and chatbots powered by AI and machine learning seems to have driven the public in Spain up the wall. The annoyance of customers, compounded by one nerve-wracking hierarchy of menu after the other, in the absence of a human being at the other end of the toll-free line had recently prompted the country’s left wing coalition government to take matters into its own hands. A new Customer Service Bill has been introduced to alleviate the pain of consumers in the country. One of the directives in this Bill makes it obligatory for companies to offer customers a human customer service agent when requested by the caller. The Bill will need the approval of the Spanish Parliament before it can be turned into a legislation.

This new Bill was brought in as too many enterprises were resorting to bureaucratic labyrinths to stop customers from exercising their right to service. While utility providers like phone and internet services have been asked to remain responsive 24/7, other services have been asked to provide ‘human’ customer services during operational hours. This progressive development in Europe is a far cry from the manner in which IVR and other technologies have been used and abused in India. Customers of services like banking, internet and telephony; and goods like consumer durables often find themselves unable to reach out to a human agent, even at the time of an emergency, such as during the loss or theft of a debit/credit card. The terror unleashed by recovery agents on customers defaulting on bank loans/credit card payments had brought disrepute to many public and private sector banks too.

In 2018, a private bus in Bengaluru was waylaid by recovery agents who held as many as 42 passengers hostage for three hours at a private parking lot in Rajarajeshwarinagar. The miscreants were contracted by a high profile credit company that had loaned a substantial sum in loans to the operator of this private bus. Hijacking the bus was how the agents planned on recovering the loans, a strategy that speaks volumes on the customer sensitisation training undergone by such service providers.

More recently, in June, a woman in Mumbai, who had sought a loan of Rs 5,000 from an online app, approached the police with a complaint. While the loan app released a sum of Rs 3,000 to the customer, what followed was a barrage of abusive and threatening calls from agents deputed by the app, who demanded that she pay back the loan. Having shared her Aadhaar, Pan card and photographs with the app based service, she was shocked to receive her morphed nude image from an unknown mobile number, who had shared that image with one of the customer’s contacts as well. These aren’t isolated episodes; last year, six people in Telangana died from suicide after they were harassed by agents recruited by instant loan apps.

Considering the rise of the digital economy, the Centre had introduced a new Consumer Protection Bill, 2019 which replaced the earlier Consumer Protection Act, 1986. Under the Act, a Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA) was also established. The body aims at regulating matters regarding violation/enforcement of consumer rights, misleading or false advertisements, unfair trade practices.

The mere existence of such laws might not help in offences perpetrated against consumers. There is a need for increased awareness among the population with regard to its rights. Corporate India also must own up to the requirement for opening up its channels of communication with its customers and not locking itself up in fortresses barricaded by chatbots and mercenaries.