Being lost is never fun, especially when you can’t see the maze. All you can do is hear it: “Listen carefully because our menu has changed. Press one for accounting. Press two for sales. Press three for human resources. Press four for the company directory …”

Automated phone systems can really push customers’ buttons – and not in a good way. Some people get mad and hang up. Others grit their teeth long enough to yell at the “real” person who finally picks up the other end. Either way, a poorly designed phone system is not good for business.

Until recently, companies had little choice about how they communicated with customers (Hiring 10 secretaries just to route calls isn’t exactly cost efficient). Now, there’s an alternative: real-time, online chat services. It’s like AOL Instant Messenger for businesses.

“Chat is becoming a channel that people want to communicate with businesses,” said Robert LoCascio, chairman and chief executive of LivePerson Inc.

Any company that has a Web site can use a chat service like LivePerson, whether it’s an Amazon.com or a small brick-and-mortar business with an unsophisticated Web site.

It works like this: You go to a company’s Web site to shop or solve a problem. If you have a question, you can click on an icon that might say “Live Help” and a chat room window will open. A customer service representative will be summoned and typed conversation will begin.

The process is faster and often less frustrating than being bounced around an automated phone system.

“It makes the customer feel warm inside,” said Alex Damra, president of Applied Innovation Management, which runs Chat4help.

But chat services aren’t a replacement for phone calls or e-mail as much as they are a companion. Not everything can be resolved over the Internet. However, the idea is to reduce the number of phone calls by offering customers an alternative.

The advantages for companies are efficiency and cost.

An employee can handle 10 to 15 customers per hour over the phone, but 20 to 35 an hour using a chat service, LoCascio said.

The reason is chat windows make it easy to help multiple customers at one time.

That difference in productivity means a phone call costs a company an average of $6 while an online chat costs $1.80.

Plus, businesses that sign up for LivePerson or Chat4help don’t have to install new computer hardware or upgrade their Web sites. Both companies are application service providers, which means that every chat is routed from your Web site, through their servers, to your employees.

“You can be up and running as a small business in 20 minutes if you want to,” LoCascio said.

New York-based LivePerson offers three tiers of service. LivePerson Pro Edition, for small companies, is $99 a month, per seat. LivePerson Service Edition is $250 to $500 per month, per seat. LivePerson Sales Edition is $2,500 a month, per seat. The more expensive editions have additional features, such as customer tracking. For instance, if online shoppers have items in their cart but are lingering for more than 10 minutes, a salesperson can ask in a pop-up window if they need help.

Chat4help is a bit cheaper, at $80 per month, per seat.

Thousands of major companies, including AT&T, Neiman Marcus and Hewlett-Packard, already use chat services, and more are signing up. Even Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland is a LivePerson client. But the market remains largely untapped.

About 80 percent of companies use automated phone systems, 10 percent use e-mail and 10 percent use chat services to communicate with customers, LoCascio said.

Those numbers aren’t likely to change much, said Ron Owens, director of professional services for Intervoice Inc., a leading provider of automated phone systems. Chat services aren’t a threat.

“I don’t see them as a substitute technology. To be truly competing, you have to be a substitute,” he said. “Even though there’s been an increase in Web use, call centers’ call volume really hasn’t gone down.”