Brazil's federal government published on Tuesday (13), in the Diário Oficial da União, the country's official gazette, Decree No. 13,135, which requires companies in regulated sectors to staff their customer service channels, known in Brazil as SACs, with human agents every day of the week, from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. The text regulates the Consumer Protection Code, repeals a 2022 decree, and takes effect 20 days after publication.
The new rules apply to companies whose services are regulated by the government: telecom operators, health insurance providers, airlines, power utilities and financial sector firms such as banks and fintechs, according to G1. The decree also covers providers of digital financial, payment or credit services supervised by the Central Bank. Ride-hailing and delivery companies, such as Uber, whose services are not regulated, are exempt from the human service requirement but must submit their customer service models to the National Consumer Secretariat (Senacon), including data on complaints, resolution rates and user satisfaction, as detailed by Atlas Público.
What changes in practice
On electronic channels, such as chats and apps, at least one channel must operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week, with real-time service by a person between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. Companies may use artificial intelligence for screening, routing and resolving requests, as long as the customer has the option of being helped by a human. Firms must also guarantee immediate access to contract cancellation and may not use more than five service levels to resolve a request.
Phone service, which remains mandatory, must offer the option to speak with a person at every level of the menu. The maximum wait will be 20 seconds for at least 80% of calls and 300 seconds, or five minutes, for the rest, unless the sector regulator sets its own rule. If a call is cut off before the issue is resolved, the company must call the customer back within five minutes, using the information already provided.
According to the government, the requirement corrects an easing of the rules adopted during the pandemic, which expanded the use of digital tools and reduced human service. For companies, the change means rebuilding human agent shifts, especially at fintechs and carriers that moved the first line of customer service to chatbots, which tends to raise operating costs. For consumers, starting in early November there will be a right to speak with a person every day, with a wait cap set by regulation and a shorter path to cancel a contract.