The AI Bot: Is The Revolt Coming?
- Scott Michajluk
- Sep 8
- 3 min read
September 8, 2025
By Scott Michajluk | Fractional COO | Founder, GO Consulting
Last week my wife asked me to sanity check a “timely” customer service email about a return. The product she ordered didn’t match the website. She wanted a full refund.
I read the email and said, “That’s a bot.”
The first reply flatly stated: no returns, no refunds. I told her to keep asking for the same thing politely, consistently. Sure enough, the ladder appeared:
Nothing changed except persistence. No new facts. No new photos. No manager. Just a script slowly inching toward the obvious resolution.
That experience says a lot about where customer service is heading and why a revolt is brewing.
Are AI bots killing customer service?
They don’t have to. But many are being deployed in ways that frustrate customers, burn out employees, and erode trust.
What’s really going on:
Cost first, customer second. Bots are rolled out to deflect tickets, not to resolve them. The metric is “containment,” not “care.”
Policy by prompt. Instead of clear rules, companies rely on clever wording. The bot’s job becomes: stall, then bargain.
No clean exits. Customers aren’t told how to reach a human. Escalation is a maze, not a moment.
Training data mismatch. Bots learn from marketing copy and old macros, not from high quality resolutions.
When your best path to a fair outcome is to outlast a script, customers will route around you with chargebacks, social posts, 1-star reviews, and churn. That is the revolt.
Why the revolt is coming (if it isn’t here already)
People can smell a stall. A “refund ladder” feels like a game, not service. Games invite escalation.
Frontline fatigue. Humans end up cleaning up bot messes, with angry customers already primed for battle.
Brand trust drops fast. One bad loop can undo years of good will especially when it’s shared online.
Regulatory and payment risk. If bots block valid returns, customers escalate to banks and regulators.
What good looks like: Human-first, AI-assisted
AI should make support faster and fairer, not harder. That requires design, not just deployment.
Principles to adopt:
Tell the truth. “You’re chatting with our virtual assistant. Ask for a human at any time.”
Two turn rule. If the bot can’t clearly resolve in two exchanges, hand off to a person.
One source of policy truth. Refunds, warranties, and exceptions live in a plain English playbook the bot and humans both use.
No dark patterns. Kill the refund ladder. Set clear thresholds (e.g., under $X or within Y days = approve).
Measure what matters. Reward first contact resolution, customer effort score, and accuracy of outcome, not containment.
Human authority beats scripts. Give reps bounded discretion to do the right thing without needing five approvals.
Continuous audits. Mystery shop your own bot monthly. If it annoys you, it’s hurting your brand.
A simple “Bot Reset” playbook (you can run this month)
Map your top 20 intents (refund, exchange, missing parts, wrong size, shipping delay…). Tag which create friction.
Write the policy in one page per intent. Inputs required, decision rules, refund thresholds, exceptions.
Design the handoff. Exact words the bot uses, what the agent sees, and what context is passed.
Train on great resolutions. Feed the bot examples of conversations that ended well, not just templates.
Instrument the flow. Track: two turn handoff rate, FCR (first contact resolution), CES (customer effort score), “redo” rate (cases reopened), and discretionary refunds.
Shadow & review. For two weeks, have humans quietly review a sample of bot outcomes daily and tune prompts/policies.
Publish your promise. “We aim to resolve in one interaction. If we miss, a human will make it right.”
For SMBs: start small and get it right
Let the bot answer FAQs and gather facts. Route money decisions (refunds/credits) to a human until your policies are crisp.
Use clear thresholds: automatic green light under $X; human review above.
Put “Talk to a person” on the first screen. Don’t make people earn it.
If you sell on trust (most SMBs do), treat service as marketing you can’t buy.
Prevent the revolt
Customers aren’t anti AI. They’re anti runaround. If your bot makes people jump through hoops to get what your policy already allows, they’ll revolt by leaving.
Tech should help your business act more human at scale, not less.
Want help fixing this?
We run focused 60-Minute Operational Health Checks that can zero in on support and service operations. In one working session we can map your top intents, clean up refund/return policies, and design a fast, fair escalation path that your customers (and team) will actually appreciate.
If that would help, message us with “Service Tune-Up” and we’ll get it on the calendar.
