The same managers who on paper agreed that 10 minutes on hold is a reasonable level of service may change their minds once they've experienced it on the phone. Good scripting, plenty of support, and ongoing evaluation cannot make an IVR anything more than a machine. Some questions are too complex to be solved by pressing one, two, or three, and some calls are too intricate to be routed automatically. And sometimes companies find they simply want to talk to their customers. It's not that IVRs can't be loaded up with every conceivable answer to every caller's every conceivable query.
Computers are, after all, extremely tolerant idiots.
The problem is that few humans are patient enough to sit on the phone for hours pressing button after button until they arrive at the exact sequence of events that culminates in their new compact disc player flinging CDs around the living room. IVRs are not realistic alternatives to live customer service for the most complex products and services. Goodman recalls a computer manufacturer that targeted gift-giving grandparents as a market. Don't even think about it, says Goodman. Even using IVRs to provide technical support for a younger tech crowd is inadvisable.