Having a human talk to you thru your screen is a game changer in e-commerce. I personally use amazon customer support chat myself very often.
> If I need assistance, I will most likely do one of the following:
>
> Find a support e-mail.
> Go to a physical store.
> Ask a friend.
> See if I find an unintrusive live chat that I chose to enable.
This is a developer mindset: take the time to solve the puzzle. I get it, but the majority of people don't think that way.
Most people don't want to solve the puzzle. They want to buy the product and get on with their day. Live chat lets them do that, and by the numbers, it works.
A few weeks ago, I had Amazon accidentally send me someone else's package, who lives about five blocks away from me. Not even the same street name. But it reported my own package as having been delivered, which clearly was not the case.
I wrestled with that stupid chatbot for probably two hours. There was no option in its menu for this specific problem. It would only allow to report not receiving something, and the only option given to me was to wait a few more days, or report the wrong item had been delivered, in which case I needed to send it back. I tried calling the support phone number instead, but it was just the same chatbot but over voice, with the same options.
But this wasn't my problem. I had the right package. It just wasn't mine. It wasn't addressed to me. If I returned it, how would they know if it was me who sent it back?
I don't even remember how I finally found a phone number to call that connected me to a human, but I'm pretty sure I had to outside of Amazon to find it. As soon as I got connected to a human and explained what happened, they were more or less instantly able to help me, but it was incredibly frustrating not having the bot itself give me an option to talk to a human. I could only complete it's automated workflows.
Amusingly, the CSR told me to just keep this other guy's package and they'd send him another, even though I could have easily walked down the street and given it to him. Fine, I guess. It was a pressure washer attachment that actually does fit my pressure washer.
I think this assessment was the root of your problem. This wasn't what happened. What happened was two separate things and the mistake was tying them together.
You didn't get your package they claimed to have delivered. Full stop. Deal with that problem.
Second, you received a package addressed to someone else. Deal with that separately.
If you need the package soon, that’s not great.
Actual chat that's passively available on request and makes clear what it is is great. Anything that pops up, makes noise, or otherwise begs for engagement, or isn't "click here for human", is an anti-feature.
I actually just complained about this yesterday- I do _not_ want to have your shitty version of clippy[0][1] flying around the screen, pulsing, and asking if I need help while I'm browsing your page. Stick it on the support/contact page and that's plenty good for me.
You answered that. Thanks.
For what?