Showerthought: A customer service call with 'Mike from Atlanta' showed me how a brand apology can feel totally fake

I called about a broken part on my new coffee maker, and the rep, Mike, gave me a scripted apology that mentioned 'valued customer' three times in two minutes. He sounded like a robot reading a note from legal, not a person who cared. It made me wonder if brands even listen to their own apologies before they send them out. Has anyone else gotten one of those canned 'sorry' speeches that just made things worse?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_luna1mo ago

Ever wonder if they even hear themselves?

holly7131mo ago

My old boss at a call center made us read those scripts word for word. The real kicker is they record calls to check, and you get marked down if you skip the "valued customer" part, even if the person is yelling at you. So Mike probably knew it sounded fake too, but his job depended on saying it. The company cares more about covering itself legally than letting a human actually talk.

sanchez.kevin1mo ago

It's like they're training people to be robots instead of solving problems. You can almost hear the life draining out of the person's voice when they have to say that stuff. The whole system is built to protect the company from lawsuits, not to have a real talk. No wonder everyone hates calling for help.