Bonum Certa Men Certa

Evri Killed Customer Support in Favour of a 100% Useless Chatbot That Wastes Your Time, Solves Nothing, and Gaslights You

posted by Roy Schestowitz on Jun 03, 2024

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Chatbots are in many ways an attack on customers/clients. They're not meant to solve issues but rather to offload work to others, giving customers/clients the false impression that support exists.

Enter Evri.

It's a British courier. It now pretends to have online "Chat" as support, but there's no person there. It's worse than a waste of time. It's arguably offensive to the customers/clients, who are left to type stuff to a useless bot that won't solve anything and won't even "listen".

Here's an example transcript from a few moments ago: (Evri calls its bot "Ezra", only the stuff in bold below comes from an actual human)

Hi, I'm Ezra
Message received at 08:07.
Ezra says:
Chatbot Icon
Ezra
Save time with an option below or tell us in your own words
Message received at 08:07.
You says:
You
hi
Message sent at 08:07.
Ezra says:
Chatbot Icon
Ezra
Ok I understand, let me try and help you here.
Message received at 08:07.
Ezra says:
Chatbot Icon
Ezra
Could you type in your tracking reference?
Message received at 08:07.
You says:
You
longtime client here
Message sent at 08:07.
Ezra says:
Chatbot Icon
Ezra
Sorry, that didn't look quite right. Can you try entering only your tracking reference again?
Message received at 08:07.
You says:
You
the site has been broken for weeks
Message sent at 08:07.
Ezra says:
Chatbot Icon
Ezra
We are still struggling to find a parcel with that tracking information. Let's try once more.. Please enter only your tracking reference number. This can be either 8 or 16 characters.
Message received at 08:07.
You says:
You
always get errors when entering the basket
Message sent at 08:08.
Ezra says:
Chatbot Icon
Ezra
To help locate your parcel, I'll need the tracking reference. If you need help finding it please click here
Message received at 08:08.
You says:
You
I don't have it
Message sent at 08:08.
Ezra says:
Chatbot Icon
Ezra
Without a tracking reference it is difficult for  us to help you. Do you need help with something else?
Message received at 08:08.
You says:
You
No thanks
Message sent at 08:08.
Ezra says:
Chatbot Icon
Ezra
Thank you. How would you rate this chat experience out of 5?

To be clear, there's no tracking number. Their site has issues and there's no way to report that. One cannot even get as far as opening the basket.

Welcome to a world of learned helplessness. You get to speak to some utterly useless bot because to Evri your time has absolutely no value. Have fun chatting for yourself (with yourself).

When it ends with "How would you rate this chat experience out of 5?" you can imagine that only some bot will batch-process the feedback. No person will even bother looking at it. So what's the point?

So now we know that not only the site/software of Evri is broken but also its customer service/support. They used to be known as Hermes UK; changing the name won't help dodge bad reputation.

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