18. May 2026

Is Customer Service Dead, or Just on Hold?

Good customer service used to be simple.

You had a problem. You spoke to someone. They listened. They understood. Then, if you were really lucky, they actually helped.

Mad, I know. A wild concept from a forgotten civilisation.

These days, customer service often feels like a punishment for daring to be a customer in the first place. You ring up, press seventeen options, listen to music that sounds like it was recorded inside a lift in 1998, then finally get through to someone who asks for a part number, account number, reference number, postcode, mother’s maiden name, blood type and the exact angle of the moon when the issue first occurred.

And after all that?

“Sorry, I can’t help you without the correct reference.”

Brilliant. Thanks. I’ll just go and scream into a throw cushion.

Good service matters. It keeps customers coming back. Not because people expect the red carpet, a brass band and someone sprinkling rose petals at their feet. They just want to feel like the company they’re paying actually knows who they are.

That should not be difficult.

Years ago, I worked for a multi-million-pound firm that was built on relationships. Proper relationships. The sales guys knew the customers. Not just their account number. Their name. What they ordered. What they usually needed. What football team they supported. Sometimes even their family names.

It was personal. Human. Effective.

Then the company got bought out.

And, as always, some corporate genius in a glass office decided the best way to improve a successful business was to remove everything that made it successful.

Suddenly it became “process-driven”. Which is corporate language for “we’ve made this worse, but we’ve put it in a flowchart”.

The personal touch disappeared. The experienced people were pushed aside. The call centre took over. Customers who used to ring up and speak to someone who knew them were now being asked for part numbers like they were trying to access a nuclear submarine.

And guess what?

The customers ran to the hills.

Never to be seen again.

Because people do not stay loyal to a company just because it has a nice logo, a new phone system and a mission statement written by someone who uses the word “synergy” without being physically sick. They stay because they feel looked after.

That is the bit too many companies forget.

Then there was Sky.

In 2025, I had an issue that left me without service for two months. Two months. Not two hours. Not two days. Two full months of paying for a service that had apparently packed its bags and moved abroad.

I rang over 25 times. No exaggeration.

Every call seemed to start from scratch. Every person asked the same questions. Every script led to another dead end. Nobody seemed able to actually take ownership of the problem.

It was like being trapped in a customer service version of Groundhog Day, except less funny and with more hold music.

Then, eventually, I got in touch with an OG from Scotland. Someone who had been there years. Someone who knew what he was doing. Someone who did not need to hide behind a script because he had something much more useful: experience.

The issue was sorted within days.

Days.

After two months of chaos, one proper person fixed it.

And the irony?

He was being made redundant after 20 years of service because of the call centres.

You could not make it up. Well, you could, but people would say it was too ridiculous.

That is the problem. Companies are getting rid of the people who actually know how to help, then wondering why customers are annoyed. They replace experience with scripts, common sense with systems, and relationships with ticket numbers.

To be fair, it is not always the fault of the person on the phone. A lot of them are doing their best. They are given a script, a screen, a headset and absolutely no power to solve anything outside the approved box.

They cannot think around a problem because the system will not let them. They cannot use judgement because the process says no. They cannot treat you like a human because the software has not loaded that option yet.

So, is customer service dead?

Not completely.

But in some companies, it is definitely lying face down in a meeting room while someone from head office explains how “streamlining the customer journey” is going really well.

Good service still exists. Usually where people are trusted, trained and allowed to care. Where staff know their customers. Where common sense has not been replaced by a dropdown menu.

Because customers remember good service.

They also remember being passed around 25 times and asked for a part number by someone who clearly cannot help them.

And when that happens, they do what customers have always done.

They leave.

No script required.