It's beyond tech and fin stuff IMO. The drive for profit has just driven customer service through the floor across pretty much every industry. If I think about all the services I use - banks, energy, SAAS, trains, internet... I don't think any one of them would provide me with a customer service email or phone number that would end me up in a conversation with a real, intelligent, English speaking, non-cribsheet following human being. Every single one would give me a chat bot, a generic email form, a number to ring that I'd have to sit on for a long time and an end result that was far from what I'd consider good, considerate customer service.
Strikes me that there is potential here for businesses to genuinely make customer service their focus, at the expense of profit or maybe by offering their services at a slightly higher premium. The Groundhog Day cycle of doom that we all feel all the time is deeply damaging to everyone concerned apart from shareholders. It'd be a breath of fresh air if companies went back to focusing on their customers first and foremost.
My experiences with Fidelity, TD Ameritrade, and Vanguard have all had that level of service, including talking to a human immediately the few times I’ve needed to.
Note that they’re all primarily investment brokers that sometimes offer banking like services.
I foresee a future where those that can afford it pay a virtual assistant (read outsourced secretary) to do this stuff for them. And as always, poor people are fucked.
Strikes me that there is potential here for businesses to genuinely make customer service their focus, at the expense of profit or maybe by offering their services at a slightly higher premium. The Groundhog Day cycle of doom that we all feel all the time is deeply damaging to everyone concerned apart from shareholders. It'd be a breath of fresh air if companies went back to focusing on their customers first and foremost.