I was recently notified that my charity’s bank is closing, which means I now have to travel to Kilmarnock to bank in person, or choose to do it online with the option of making deposits at the Post Office.

Speaking with this bank and other banks, it seems this is the way things are going. There is apparently no need to have face-to-face interaction with customers any more. And apparently, the forecast is that within the next 10 years, all banks will be either unmanned or closed.

It got me thinking about other “advances” in customer service, for instance, manned checkouts in supermarkets being decreased while the number of self-service checkouts increase.

Soon we will have completely staff-free supermarkets - in fact, Amazon have already started this with their chain of Amazon Go cashierless grocery stores.

It’s also difficult to speak to an actual person when calling telephone companies, paying your utility bills, organising insurance, trying to get a doctor’s appointment, etc etc. It seems that every customer-facing service is being slowly replaced by automated responses and online services.

Everyone is also being urged to pay by card because paying with cash means having to employ an actual person to empty the machine and bank the money.

On a recent visit to Livingston, I popped into a buffet restaurant for lunch, and my drink order was delivered by a robot waiter.

The uniqueness of this made it seem fun at the time, but it’s not difficult to see the bigger impact of what it would be like when all waiters are replaced with robots. We are heading into a digital/online age of no physical interaction, and this is what worries me the most.

Human beings need to interact. We thrive in groups. Take this interaction away and where does that leave us?

I know of many people who enjoy going to the shops, the library, a café and even the Post Office to pick up their pension, because it gets them out of the house and gives them the chance to interact with someone. Sometimes that chat in the bank is the only time they will interact with another person all week.

Many of our charity’s service users only leave the house for their weekly personal safety sessions with us and to go shopping.

During our session, I guarantee they will be smiling and maybe even laughing, and this obviously boosts their mental health. It feels good to laugh. Unfortunately, you can’t interact and laugh with a recorded voice or an automated machine.

I am convinced that heading into a digital age of no customer interaction will have a huge impact on people’s mental health. We are social beings. We need that interaction, however small it may be, to make us smile, laugh, or just talk.

We need to feel connected, to see another person’s face, to look into their eyes, to feel their concern, their compassion, their love. You won’t get that with texts, recorded messages or robots.

So I am wondering, am I the only person that is worried about this progression?

Let me know what you think about the closure of banks, self-service checkouts, robot waiters and paying by card. Is it the beginning of the end of customer interaction?  

In the meantime, stay safe.