It's funny because I had my first encounter with one last week and my first reaction when I realised it was a robot was "let me talk to a human".
I am mostly ok talking to a bot for FAQ still queries but I just don't want to interact with a machine when things are going wrong. I want someone with actual empathy even if they refuse to use it.
Empathy is probably part of it, but I guess what matters to me is someone able to think outside of the box at least a little, and try to solve an actual problem - since the problem is likely caused by the shape of the box.
The biggest issue with these systems is they are designed to handle the common case. But if I had a common case, I literally wouldn’t be having an issue!
Humans usually recognize it pretty quickly if you explain it to them, ‘AI’ usually just keeps steering you to the same box.
Though recently I did hit a system that immediately sent me to a human when I described the problem, which was refreshing!
I guess they are made for the common case since a lot of people's first actions is to talk to someone and most cases are common. Since I usually have already gotten through the FAQ, I also rarely am helped by the AI CS.