Products · Pattern or everyday thing
IVR phone systems
Raised as a usability problem by 9 people on Hacker News over 9 years (2018–2026), in 9 threads.
No issue was raised by at least 3 people in 3 threads this year.
No issue was raised by at least 3 people in 3 threads in the last 5 years.
Every issue, all time, most people first
Unreviewed issues were grouped by machine: Claude Haiku labelled each comment as a usability complaint, named what it's about and summed up the problem in a line, and a small model grouped similar problems. Nobody has checked them by hand. Expect mistakes.
The newest 8 complaints
- Can't skip the voice recording to press menu options; forced to wait through prompts2026-03-22
- Voice phone systems can't solve problems, forcing users to mash buttons and waste time2023-04-09
- People can't figure out how to get past the voice system to a human2023-01-13
- Speech recognition misunderstands similar-sounding letters and jargon, forcing users to repeat or re-enter information2022-01-07
- Callers can't get to a live agent, so they mash zero or hang up2020-02-04
- Phone ordering voice system reads out every option at a fixed pace, which is maddening2019-10-08
- Speech recognition errors frustrate callers, and the voice menus just copy keypad menus2018-06-08
- Hangs up after one or two repetitions if you need time to find information2018-05-10