Complaints are not a bot's job
A complaining customer wants to be heard by someone who can act. A bot explaining policy to them makes it worse in a way that is difficult to recover.
The single most damaging thing a chatbot can do is make an already unhappy customer feel they are being managed rather than helped.
What it should do
- Detect the dissatisfaction from the wording, not from a menu
- Acknowledge it briefly and without excuses
- Say a person will pick this up, and when
- Capture contact details if not already known
- Escalate immediately, flagged, with the full transcript
What it must not do
- Explain why the policy is what it is
- Ask them to repeat what happened
- Offer or refuse a refund
- Apologise repeatedly — once, sincerely, then escalate
- Suggest they read a help article
Escalation has to be real
“A member of our team will be in touch” that results in nothing for three days makes the complaint worse. Route it to someone who will actually see it.
Out of hours, say so and give a specific time. An honest wait is accepted; an unexplained silence is not.
Read every one
Complaint conversations are the most informative data your chat produces. They tell you what is going wrong operationally, in the customer's own words, immediately.
Review all of them, not a sample. There will not be many, and each one is worth the five minutes.