Organizations paying more to hire service agents despite AI-driven restructuring

New research has concluded that organizations are paying more to hire customer service agents, despite AI-driven restructuring. What's more, service agents in the business services and consulting sector pose the highest flight risk among studied industries.

The insights are published by Payscale and draw on proprietary data from its compensation dataset. Payscale looked at how much new hires command when compared with tenured employees and, across three types of customer service agent roles, organizations were paying more to attract talent than to retain it.  

The insights explained that while some organizations may have reduced headcount because AI tools are handling routine support tasks, "they still need experienced representatives for escalations, retention, and complex customer issues".

Payscale said that, as a result, "employers offer higher pay to attract a smaller pool of qualified new hires with stronger technical or multitasking skills, while existing employees remain on older compensation structures with limited raise budgets, creating situations where new hires can earn more on the open market".

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How much are newly-hired customer service agents paid in 2026?

The research initially looked into how compensation differs within "job families", that is broadly-grouped professional roles across multiple industries. Here, customer service roles were paid higher for tenured employees, who averaged a 20 percent advantage. 

Payscale's chief compensation strategist Ruth Thomas said this "reflects the value of institutional knowledge, escalation judgment, and customer relationships built over time". She added: "The market is recognizing this."

However, when the figures are drilled down by industry, a different picture emerges. 

Payscale's analysis concluded that customer service agents enjoy a new hire advantage in three industries: business services and consulting, commercial and consumer services, and consumer goods. As outlined in the table below, the difference in pay commanded by new hires is 42 percent, 27 percent and two percent, respectively, creating a "market advantage" for those who are willing to change jobs.

According Ruth Thomas the gap is driven by "employers paying a premium for a skill set that's hard to find right now". This skillset includes the ability to handle "complex, judgment-intensive interactions alongside AI tools, not the routine volume that automation has largely absorbed".

Source: Payscale

The trend isn't exclusive to service roles in the profiled industries. Other jobs with a market advantage include marketing analysts, product managers, compliance specialists, quality control managers, and IT UX specialists. On average, these new hires earn 3.6 percent higher pay on average than their tenured counterparts in 2026. 

Is there a great resignation ahead for service agents? 

If new hires are successfully commanding higher pay, there appears to be little incentive for experienced agents to stay in their current roles. 

On whether this could trigger a "great resignation" trend similar to the early 2020s, Thomas is apprehensive. Despite the pay gap being commanded in some roles, she says the overall data shows a "job-hugging market where employees are staying put because uncertainty makes moving feel risky". 

However, that patience isn't unlimited, "and it isn't the same as satisfaction," she warns. 

"Organizations that have let pay drift out of alignment with what the role actually requires today – not what the job description said three years ago – are building pressure they may not see coming. When market conditions shift, the departure risk that's been quietly accumulating will surface fast," she says.

How to avoid losing long-term talent in the contact center  

Thomas said that to avoid losing long-term talent organizations must stop reading low turnover as "a signal that compensation is working". 

She added: "In this market, people are staying out of caution. That's not the same as staying because they feel recognized, valued, or fairly paid. Your retention strategy has to account for that distinction before the market shifts."

According to Thomas, CX leaders also need to benchmark compensation at the role and industry level, not just the job family level. "A single aggregate number can mask exactly the kind of inversion we're seeing in parts of customer service right now," she said.

In light of the sweeping change AI has triggered, organizations should also be updating job architectures to reflect the true role and responsiblities agents hold at present. "The job of a customer service representative has been significantly rewritten by AI and market pressure," Thomas said.

"Reps managing escalations, working alongside AI tools, and multitasking across channels are doing fundamentally different work than what that same role required a few years ago. Pay structures that haven't caught up are creating an attraction gap even when retention looks fine on the surface," she added. 

Finally, Thomas said the employee side of a business "deserves the same data rigor as the customer side". 

She explained: "You already track response times, CSAT scores, and churn signals closely. A disengaged or underpaid frontline rep shows in those numbers before they show up in your turnover report. Pay gaps are an early attrition signal, and treating them that way, rather than waiting for a resignation to confirm the problem, is where the real retention leverage is."

Can AI reduce costs in the contact center? 

As outlined, some organizations have reduced headcount in favor of using more AI tools with a small pool of skilled human agents on hand for complex and edge cases. 

Artificial intelligence (AI) is widely regarded as a means by which to reduce staffing costs in the contact center, and service leaders report mounting pressure to utilize AI for "low-level" contact queries. Others have told CX Network there is growing momentum in the marketplace to hire new service leaders who can carve out and restructure teams to pave the way for broader AI use that will reduce overall headcount and costs.

However, a 2026 survey of 6,000 consumers highlighted the importance of skilled human agents in the service suite. AnswerConnect and OnePoll found as many as 83 percent of consumers said they prefer speaking with a real person rather than AI and one in three said they would hang up if they reached an AI system.

The upfront investment is also more complex than business leaders first realized and pricing models differ drastically, even for similar capabilities. Cost models range from per‑minute billing with added fees when an agentic bot resolves an inquiry, to flat per‑resolution pricing and mandatory annual minimum commitments tied to projected usage. 

Many are also now experiencing spiralling token costs.

A 2025 report from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) concluded that 95 percent of enterprise AI and generative AI pilots fail to deliver measurable financial returns.

Jason Bradshaw, keynote speaker, consultant and founder of the Power Of CEX consultancy, says the "greatest danger in 2026" is the over-reliance on AI as a cost-reduction tool or silver bullet. 

"While agentic AI and personalization technologies are powerful, chasing them without clarity of purpose leads to sterile, less differentiated experiences," he says. Instead, Bradshaw says CX leaders must view every new tool through one simple lens: does this make the experience more connected, more valuable, and more aligned with our brand promise? "If not, it's just another shiny distraction," he adds.

"Before taking the next step, ask the most important question of all: does this add more value to the customer's experience?"

Quick links 

• Is AI taking CX jobs?
• Your contact center AI is succeeding, but are your customers still suffering?
• Securing the contact center in the AI era: Prompt injection, consumer privacy, and data integrity