Is Asos' Facebook page run by bots? Customer service responses cause confusion among shoppers
Asos shoppers have been left wondering if the retailer's page is managed by an army of bots posing as customer service assistants following a series of bizarre, nonsensical interactions.
While the brand has denied that it uses an automated system to answer customer enquiries on social, customers have taken to the platform to express their frustration in light of robotic-sounding responses on the fashion house's Australian page.
The Facebook drama kicked off when Perth resident Nick Paterniti enquired about his $1200 order which had reportedly been lost by Asos' courier.
Asos representitive Ashley's reply appeared to be slightly confused, seemingly asking Paterni to send a picture of the lost items.
When the original poster's friends got involved, things got even stranger. With Asos' admin sending irrelevant responses to random sentences.
While Asos' Ashley contested claims that she was a bot, a string of other messages prompted those involved to deduce otherwise.
When Facebook unveiled its brand chatbots earlier this year, some marketers were quick to warn that they should provide a streamlined customer experience rather than one that would make things more difficult.
Asos has denied that messages to customers are automatically generated, posting on Twitter: "We don't do automated responses – we respond this way because we can't discuss customers' details publicly!"
"We can understand how this looks, but we're only trying to ensure that we help all of our customers that get in touch."
Some of the shop's (human) moderators didn't miss a trick though, telling customers to "keep it clean".
The Drum has reached out to Asos for further comment.