Do you prefer canned or fresh vegetables?  If you're like most people, you're likely less fond of canned vegetables.  And, chances are, you are even less of a fan of canned responses when it comes to customer service.

Mila D'Antonio at 1to1 shares an amusing anecdote about a "creepy" in-store experience where canned responses had her questioning the sincerity of her customer service reps, and the logic behind the retailer's decision making.

There's a lesson to be learned here when it comes to online chat aswell.  While canned responses can be a tremendous way to improve agent efficiency (and lower time to resolution) by providing agents with predetermined responses to common questions, they must be used wisely!  If the context of when and where you use them is wrong, you risk "creeping" out your customers or, even worse, losing them.

In many cases, relying too heavily on canned responses could defeat the purpose of offering customers live assistance to begin with.