Self-service is great for buying gas, and getting cash at an ATM, and for booking a flight. My favorite, uh, 'restaurant' over here in Japan is 'self-service'; you punch in your order at a vending machine, hand a ticket to the staff, and they bring you your meal.
Self-service sucks when you have a problem that needs to be solved, and it sucks worse when you have a problem that needs to be solved now.
Because, more often than not, you have a problem because you stepped outside the bounds of what the company 'normally' provides, be it rescheduling a flight or getting a refund for a weird-tasting hamburger.
It's exactly at those moments where you want to talk to a human being who can (a) understand the problem, and (b) fix it.
This is the reason my company, Mad Wombat, exists. We do an email-based helpdesk application designed to remove every possible barrier between 'the customer having a problem' and 'you fixing that problem and making them happy'.
Self-service sucks when you have a problem that needs to be solved, and it sucks worse when you have a problem that needs to be solved now.
Because, more often than not, you have a problem because you stepped outside the bounds of what the company 'normally' provides, be it rescheduling a flight or getting a refund for a weird-tasting hamburger.
It's exactly at those moments where you want to talk to a human being who can (a) understand the problem, and (b) fix it.
This is the reason my company, Mad Wombat, exists. We do an email-based helpdesk application designed to remove every possible barrier between 'the customer having a problem' and 'you fixing that problem and making them happy'.