Career
Customer service representatives
Be the person who answers when customers need help.
Here's what you actually need to know.
The work
What people in this job do
- Confer with customers by telephone or in person to provide information about products or services, take or enter orders, cancel accounts, or obtain details of complaints.
- Keep records of customer interactions or transactions, recording details of inquiries, complaints, or comments, as well as actions taken.
- Check to ensure that appropriate changes were made to resolve customers' problems.
- Contact customers to respond to inquiries or to notify them of claim investigation results or any planned adjustments.
- Determine charges for services requested, collect deposits or payments, or arrange for billing.
The outlook
How the forecast changed this year
AI
BLS now cites artificial intelligence in this occupation's outlook: “share decreases as advances in speech and language processing and in artificial intelligence (AI) allow computers to handle customer service interactions with greater frequency.”
The deeper question
What kind of person does this path ask you to become?
What this work centers on
O*NET interest profile, scored 1–7.
The work
Do you want most of your days spent on information & systems, then persuasion & leadership?
Responsibility
Are you willing to be the one responsible for this?
“Confer with customers by telephone or in person to provide information about products or services, take or enter orders, cancel accounts, or obtain details of complaints.”
Development
What would you need to build over the next 5–10 years?
Active Listening, Service Orientation, Speaking, Reading Comprehension.
Trade-offs
What does it ask of you in exchange?
No degree beyond high school, though short-term on-the-job training is typical, for a median of $44,770 a year and 289,500 openings nationally each year.
Paths in
Degrees that lead here
- ReceptionistCIP 52.0406
- Customer Service Support/Call Center/Teleservice OperationCIP 52.0411
Paths across
Careers that use similar skills
- Sales Representatives of Services, Except Advertising, Insurance, Financial Services, and Travel$69,990 · +2.7%
- Telemarketers$35,450 · -21.4%
- Insurance Claims and Policy Processing Clerks$49,230 · -1.9%
- Credit Authorizers, Checkers, and Clerks$50,080 · -7.4%
- New Accounts Clerks$47,670 · -6.5%
Ask anything about this career.
“Would this make sense if I don't want to sit at a desk all day?” Answers will come from the sources on this page, with citations. Coming soon.
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Sources
- BLS Employment Projections, 2025–35, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Retrieved 2026-10-01.
- BLS Employment Projections, 2024–34 (archived), U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Retrieved 2026-10-01.
- O*NET 31.0 Database (August 2026), National Center for O*NET Development / U.S. Department of Labor. Retrieved 2026-10-01.
- CIP 2020 to SOC 2018 Crosswalk, NCES and BLS. Retrieved 2026-10-01.