Given the choice, your customers would choose your live chat option 100% of the time.

Okay, okay, maybe I’m projecting.

But research shows that 41% of people prefer live chat as a support channel. That’s more than the proportion of people who would choose phone, email, or social media—by a significant margin. 

Live chat support is just so convenient for customers. You get immediate and personal interaction without the annoying experience of waiting on hold (and dreadful hold music). 

But meeting customer expectations on live chat takes a lot of work. Staffing live chat support effectively brings a constant dance between inbound chat volume and available support agents. Giving your team the tools and training to efficiently deliver great chat experiences is essential to your live chat success. 

Live chat scripts are one of those critical tools.

Are live chat scripts a double-edged sword?

There are obvious advantages to using scripts as a support team. It may be self-explanatory, but let’s go through some of them to illustrate:

• They make you significantly faster. 
• They’re a great way to capture and retain knowledge. 
• They can serve as a training guide for agents, helping them hit the right tone and style of communication.
• They provide a fall-back option for agents, especially in high-stress situations.

The problems begin when scripts are used too liberally. 29% of consumers find scripted, impersonal responses the most frustrating of responses, and 38% of businesses agree that their users hate overly scripted responses.

Here’s the easy solution: Use scripts that enhance the quality of your support and always leave room for personalization. 

Believe it or not, 95% of customers would take slightly slower and higher-quality support, rather than get a boilerplate response a few minutes sooner. In fact, organizations with higher wait times tend to have higher customer satisfaction ratings.

Nailing this approach is easier said than done, so we’ve tried our best to provide scripts that can fit into that strategy.

42 expert customer service scenario scripts for live chat support

Below we’ve included scripts for all kinds of common customer support scenarios. These categories include: 

• Personalized greetings
• Asking for more info
• Active listening
• Handling difficult situations
• Transferring or putting on hold
• Closing the conversation

While you can copy-and-paste these scripts to start using them immediately, make sure that they reflect your brand’s voice and tone first. If not, tweak the voice where needed and you’ll be ready to go.

Customer service greeting scripts

You might have heard the saying, “You never get a second chance to make a first impression.” 

We know instinctively that first impressions matter. 

In the context of business, they can make or break an opportunity. In the context of support, they can influence the customer’s overall satisfaction with your service. Taking the time to personalize your greeting gives the impression that you’re treating that customer as an individual.

Here are a few greeting chat scripts to start with:

1. Hello, [Customer Name]! Thank you for contacting [Business Name]. How can I help?
2. Hey there! We appreciate you using [Service Name]. We’re happy to help you with any questions you have.
3. Hi, [Customer Name]! Thanks for reaching out. Give me just a moment to read your message and I’ll do my best to help.
4. Welcome back, [Customer Name]! It’s great to see you again. How can I assist you today?
5. Hi, [Customer Name]! Welcome back to [Business Name]. Did you manage to resolve [the previous issue]?

Scripts to ask for more info

Some issues, especially if they’re technically complex, need a lot of back-and-forth before you can pinpoint a cause and solution. When you’re a customer contacting support, that back-and-forth can feel like a hurdle to overcome. This is especially true if you need to confirm someone’s identity and ask them for information that’s hard to find. 

That’s why how you ask makes all the difference. Here are some ways to phrase it that can make it feel easier:

1. Sorry, you ran into trouble! I need just a little more info before I can look into this for you, and then we’ll get it sorted. Can you send us [this]?
2. I’m happy to help! I’ll get right to it, but I need some more info from you. 
3. Can you confirm your account number for me? You can find it [by going to your profile settings].
4. Thanks for explaining the issue in so much detail! I’d like to look up the previous case you opened with us. Could you let me know which email you sent it from?
5. Sure, I think I understand what you need. Do you mind walking me through how you’ve tried to solve this?
6. Great, I can help you out with that. What I need from you is [this extra information].

Scripts for active listening

Did you know that 96% of consumers say empathy is essential in a customer support interaction? That isn’t the most surprising statistic out there, but it highlights just how much of a difference empathy makes. 

Demonstrating active listening and making your customer feel heard might be the second most important part of providing support—second only to solving the actual problem. 

Active listening is particularly important if there’s a communication barrier you’re trying to overcome. Here are some ways to start:

1. Let me just make sure I understand you right. You’d like to [rephrase the customer’s question]. Is that accurate?
2. If my understanding is correct, you’re looking for a way to [do this]?
3. Sorry to hear you ran into that issue. The good news is: We can fix it! Here’s how.
4. Let me check that I have this right. You need help with [restated problem], correct?
5. I can totally understand how frustrating that was. Would you mind waiting a couple of minutes while I look into that for you?
6. I hear you, and I’m sorry to hear that didn’t work as expected. Give me a second to look into it on my end and see what I can do.
7. It looks like I can’t reproduce this on my end. Would you mind sending me [a screenshot or video] so I can make sure I’m looking in the right place?
8. Ah, I understand what you’re trying to do. We don’t offer this as a current feature but I do have a workaround. You can [do this instead].

Scripts for difficult situations

Your support agents will inevitably encounter high-stress situations that they have to defuse. There are several keys to tackling difficult situations with customers:

• You have to stay composed and professional.
• Demonstrating active listening and empathy (which we’ve already covered) can help calm the customer down.
• Apologizing and taking responsibility often go a long way. 
• After apologizing, you need to present a solution or an explanation clearly and concisely.
• If possible, involve the customer in solving the problem as well, so they feel a sense of ownership and empowerment too. 

Scripts can be incredibly helpful for these situations because they make it much easier to stay calm.

1. That sounds like a frustrating problem, I hear you. I can recommend [these alternative solutions]. Would you be up for trying that out?
2. Sorry you ran into such a persistent issue. I’m looking into this right now and will get back to you as soon as possible.
3. I’m so sorry you experienced that. We strive to provide a much better experience than what you’ve had today. I’m going to discuss your feedback with my supervisor and see what I can do to help.
4. I completely understand. Let me look into this with my team and see what we can do here.
5. I’m afraid [the offer] is no longer available. What I can offer you instead is [this].
6. I hear your frustration and understand where you’re coming from, [Customer Name]. Let me try to fix this for you. 
7. I can see why you’d like to do that. We don’t offer this feature right now [because of this reason]. Our Product team has heard this request before, and I’ve added your insights as well. Hopefully we can provide a better solution in future.
8. Thank you so much for your patience. Sorry, you’ve had to wait! I’ll look into this right away.

Scripts to transfer or put a customer on hold

Transferring a customer to someone else shouldn’t be that risky, right? 

And yet, 72% of customers with bad support experiences cite having to explain their problem to multiple people as the top reason. 

Here are some easy live chat examples to avoid that:

1. Thanks for reaching out! I’ll connect you with my colleague, [name], who’s the best person to help you out. Would you mind waiting a couple of minutes while I explain the situation?
2. Thanks for explaining that to me! I understand what you’d like to do, so I’ll transfer you to my colleague, who works in a dedicated team for requests like yours. I’ll put you on hold for just a moment while I let them know what you’re looking for. 
3. Sorry about that and thanks for waiting! I’m here to help now.
4. I’m going to have to send you over to my colleague, who can help you out. Thanks for your patience!
5. Alright, I understand. I’ll have to look into this. Would you mind waiting for a couple of minutes? I’ll get back to you as soon as I can. 
6. Please hold on for a moment while I check your account. It won’t take long. 
7. That’s a great question. I’ll need to look into it. Would you rather wait on hold for a few minutes or would you prefer I send you an email instead?
8. Sorry about the wait! It looks like all agents on that team are currently busy. We estimate that someone will be free in [5 minutes]. Are you okay to wait or would you prefer we follow up via email?

Scripts to close the conversation

Last but not least, we’ve got these live chat response examples to help you wrap up chat customer service conversations on a positive note. Closing a conversation can feel repetitive for an agent who talks to multiple customers a day, but each customer contacts you only once (hopefully!):

1. Thanks for reaching out to us today! We’re always happy to hear from you if you have any other questions or feedback. 
2. Thanks for visiting our website! We hope you enjoy [product] from here on out. Have a great day!
3. I’m glad I could help today! Thanks for chatting with us and have a good one.
4. Glad we managed to sort that out! Enjoy the rest of your day.
5. Great! Feel free to contact us again any time you need more help. 
6. There’ll be a brief feedback survey after I close the chat. I’d really appreciate you taking the time to fill it out.
7. We’re always happy to help! If you could take a second to fill out our feedback survey, I’d be very grateful.

Provide faster and better live chat support

All live support channels have an extra element of pressure because you have to provide an immediate response to the customer. Preparing the core of those responses in advance—by creating live chat scripts—takes some of that weight off your agents’ shoulders and gives them room to focus on personalizing the interaction itself. 

Live chat scripts help you enhance the quality of your support because you can take the time to craft them well. 
And if you want to make sure you’re consistently using them properly, there’s no better way than to ask for feedback afterward. Your customers will let you know. For the easiest way to get started understanding your customers, try out a free trial of Nicereply today.

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