Booking an ACC taxi for an appointment on Wednesday took 45 minutes and involved four different people.
Then I ordered a same-day courier. The courier couldn’t scan my passport as identification, which led to more calls simply to arrange another pickup.
More people. More calls. More time spent trying to complete supposedly simple tasks.
Are the systems broken? Are employees undertrained? Or is communication between organisations, staff and customers failing?
Online services and artificial intelligence promise speed, convenience and efficiency. But those benefits are lost when technology does not work, staff cannot resolve exceptions, or customers must repeatedly explain the same problem.
Things could change positively. Organisations could provide better training, give frontline employees the authority to solve problems, and design systems around real customer experiences—not just ideal ones. Technology should make it easy to reach a capable human when something goes wrong. Information should follow the customer, so one failed step does not trigger a chain of calls. AI could help identify problems, guide staff and reduce repetitive steps that could take a single administrative task.
But technology alone is not the answer. Good communication, clear responsibility and well-supported employees are just as important.
Systems are only useful when they work for the people hoping to use them.
