Half of companies planning to replace customer service with AI are reversing course

Editor's take: Customer care has become one of the most notorious business failures of the digital age, and everyone knows it. Now, artificial intelligence threatens to take this horror show of impersonal, unreliable service to a whole new level.

Within a couple of years, 50 percent of the organizations that had planned to replace their customer service personnel with AI models are expected to reverse their decision. According to a recent survey from Gartner, the original goals were overly ambitious – and ultimately unachievable. The transition to an AI-focused business world is proving to be far more challenging than initially anticipated.

In March 2025, the US research firm surveyed 163 leaders in the customer service and support industry. Nearly all respondents (95 percent) now say they plan to retain human workers while "strategically" evaluating what role AI technologies can realistically play within their organizations.

Kathy Ross, senior director analyst at ...