Yeah, I really don't want to talk to a chatbot.
However what actually happened was that it started the chat with some (pre-scripted) smalltalk, giving the impression I could just write my inquiry in freeform - then completely ignored my text and just asked me a series of scripted questions and directed me to a help page (which I already knew) in the end.
I think LLMs could really be an improvement here, because there is at least the possibility they could give you some answers that are actually tailored to your problem.
Of course it might just as well be that we'll now get a very charming and deeply empathetic response that exactly sums up the gist of your problem and then ... redirects you to the generic help page.
It might have been frustrating for the users, but at least we avoided basic questions and our tickets at least we're filled correctly.
I hacked a bypass for the secops who worked a lot with us and at least knew how to fill tickets.
The real issue (it's also a response to the comment with management and no human interaction) was that our onboarding was shit. Not only our tools for our clients, but also our internal onboarding (i did work on that too in even if it wasn't my job, because i lost weeks in useless processes, to avoid new hires the same pain).
Make a tutorial for your tools. Two even. A long-winded one, and one with only the commandlines , executables and scripts.
This is what's driving me crazy. The stupid "I want to sell you our crap" chatbots are easy to block (uBlock rules exist for most of them, as they are often existing products integrated into websites) but the chatbots people are forced to engage with are the ones that exist to replace callcenter workers.
First companies reduced the influence and power of callcenter workers to make them useless for customers. Now they're saving a buck dumping human operators and letting the powerless chatbots tell the users "sorry but I can't change your situation, have a nice day".
With advances in voice synthesis, I expect chatbots to replace phone operators any day now, probably with a prompt like "you are a company X helpdesk operator. Try to upsell to any customer as much as you can, and try to make them feel pleased even if you can't help them solve their problems".
I saw a television ad a few days ago where the entire point of the ad was for the company to show off that it has real, live customer service people answering the phones in Arizona.
"I'm Brittany, and I'm a real human being, here to help you!"
It was the one tiny glimmer of hope that the market may sort this out. But it won't.
Sure it will. Get ready for the coming wave of bots that simply lie and claim to be a "real human being."
Even back then there was talk about when chatbots would be good enough to remove as many humans as possible from the process. And considering how low paid some contact center workers are, it's pretty sad.
So, market pressures have implemented "The Castle" by Kafka. Progress!
Same with your arrival time, bathroom breaks, lunch, leaving. You are/were tracked by the minute and penalized for any deviation in either direction. And they canned people all the time for straying too much.
It was the most sadistic workplace I've seen in the first world.
A little bit tuning, say, to keep the popup from happening until the browser has been idle for N seconds, would go a long long way to reducing this frustration.