The purpose of using pre-recorded messages is to increase the probability (and in some cases error-proof the process so) that the right information is provided to customers at the right time.
The tones are masked and the information passes directly into the customer relationship management system or payment gateway in the case of credit card transactions.
It is tedious because you spend the bulk of your day, not talking to qualified leads, but in getting wrong numbers and answering machines.
[2] As good and as ubiquitous as predictive dialing technology has become, it still makes a lot of mistakes because the phone number inputs are outdated.
Finally, contribution amounts and conversion rates can be improved by adding some intelligence into the scripts, for example by raising and lowering the initial contribution amount based on the wealth of the area you are calling into or using pre-recorded audio with different accents, Southern when calling in the South, for example.
[3] Just as automation has benefited manufacturing by reducing the mental and physical effort required of workers while simultaneously improving throughput, quality, and safety, agent-assisted automation is improving call center results while reducing the tiring aspects of the job for agents.
[4] Second, in theory, the more steps that can be automated and the more logic that can be built into the call flow (e.g., if the customer buys items 2 and 9, then disclosures a, c, and f are read by the pre-recorded audio), then companies may be able to reduce the amount of training that is required of the agents while at the same time ensuring more consistency and accuracy.
Despite the large amount of money call centers have spent over decades trying to reduce between-agent variation, the problem is still so prevalent that one large study of customer interactions with call centers found that a customer's experience was completely a function of the quality of the agent who happened to answer the phone.