UK Government's New Pension Portal Operator Tells Users To Wait for AI Before Complaining (theregister.com) 27
Capita, the UK outsourcer that won a $323 million contract to administer the nation's Civil Service Pension Scheme for 1.7 million members, has responded to a disastrous portal launch by asking users to hold off on complaints until its new AI chatbots go live.
The service launched on December 1 and immediately ran into problems including unrecognized passwords, broken links and placeholder text scattered across unfinished pages. In a December 17 email to members, The Register reports today, managing director Chris Clements said Capita was "working tirelessly" and promised "one of the biggest services in the United Kingdom with AI at its core" by March.
He asked users whose enquiries were not urgent to wait until the new year before contacting support again.
The service launched on December 1 and immediately ran into problems including unrecognized passwords, broken links and placeholder text scattered across unfinished pages. In a December 17 email to members, The Register reports today, managing director Chris Clements said Capita was "working tirelessly" and promised "one of the biggest services in the United Kingdom with AI at its core" by March.
He asked users whose enquiries were not urgent to wait until the new year before contacting support again.
Users should (Score:5, Funny)
R2: Bots arguing with bots, how perverse (Score:2)
"And your mother is a rusty toaster!"
Re: R2: Bots arguing with bots, how perverse (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
Needs to be bottified: "And your father is powered by rotting elderberries!"
Re: (Score:1)
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I've been trying out ChatGPT for GDPR complaints. It's actually not bad.
Failure (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: Failure (Score:3)
I don't think the Government has a great track record of running complex systems either though
Yes, because for some reason, after failure after failure after monumental clusterfuck successive governments still keep awarding contracts to the likes of Crapita and Accenture.
Re: (Score:2)
just in case of wonderment, the reason is money transfer from gov to private sector. rich people sucking on the tapayer blood.
Re: Failure (Score:3)
Re: Failure (Score:3)
On the contrary. Administrations have a great track record of running incredibly complex systems since 150 years. With pen and paper. And rubber stamps.
And that even surprisingly reliable.
It's just neither cheap or fast. The big screwups usually happen when they are trying to become that. Or "efficient"
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We should not be paying these private companies to run core government tech. Such things like this should be done in house and not for profit. Why pay more for less. They've proven themselves incompetent numerous times yet we throw taxpayer money at them constantly. Disgusting.
Because Torynomics says that the private industry is automagically better because reasons (something, something, something, the 70s, don't mention the last 15 years, something something).
Story time children.
Once upon a time in a land far away there was a council, this council was conservative. One day, the wicked witch of Sita came to speak to the council and said "give me your refuse and I'll make it go cheap". The conservatives shone with glee as they were greedy and this avarice was their weakness.
You think it's bad now, just wait (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:You think it's bad now, just wait (Score:5, Funny)
The AI will introduce a whole new layer of sh!tty misdirection and incorrect answers!
I was gonna say, this sounds like the most English thing ever. "You think this is terrible? Just you wait for the AIs. Then you'll have something to complain about."
Blow-offs scaled up and out (Score:4, Insightful)
Lone Asshole: Talk to the hand
Collective Assholes a decade ago: Please wait, your call is very important to us...
New Collective Assholes: Talk to the bot
Really glad to see them using AI chatbots (Score:1)
Bigly! (Score:3)
... managing director Chris Clements said Capita was "working tirelessly" and promised "one of the biggest services in the United Kingdom with AI at its core"
It really does sound like something the Traffic Cone in Chief might say.
Yes, but I want to complain... (Score:1)
...about the use of AI chatbots...
Imminent retirement? (Score:2)
What if you're about to retire and unable to access your pension because of this shitshow? Or if you need to urgently transfer out, or share your pension to finalize a divorce? It's a regulated service that people depend on for their money and livelihood. This kind of a fuck up is simply unacceptable.
NOTHING works in the UK (Score:2)
Not even AI.
Re: (Score:2)
Buses work fine in London. So there’s that
Capita et al: Sam Freedman was spot on (Score:2)
He wrote about them more than a year ago. The basic thesis is here: https://samf.substack.com/p/co... [substack.com]