I think those kiosks with the big touch screen and the mobile apps work pretty well already, I always rather use them and see a picture what I can order instead of talking to the person.
tbh I'd rather not see the picture when it comes to mcdonald's, as it can only lead to a disappointment
To be fair, you'll be disappointed either way. At least with the menu, they can feel like they're selling decent food (their pictures do look decent) and you can make sure your order is correct.
I've stopped waiting in drive thrus because it's faster and more convenient to order it ahead of time and pick it up inside.
I used the Mcdonalds app a few times and the drivethru was always faster, lmao.
They require location services and don't start cooking until you're inside their geofence, but IME they seem to still prioritize drivethru customers.
I have disabled location settings because it tracks the drive from my home. I enable it to use any deals and close the app after ordering and taking a photo of the order number. They start cooking after you let them know the code in the drive-thru. No need to open the app. They do prioritize drive-thru’s because their performance is tracked based off that. That’s why they sometimes ask you to pull ahead from the window. I never worked there, I just noticed the timing screen in the kitchen when I used to do DoorDash, which tracked when a car got in and out of the line. They used to act as though I was invisible and only served drive-thru.
I use them but they are definitely made to be annoying.
I prefer just saying “can I get a medium #2 combo, please.” And being done with it.
Fuck all, I hate those things. Just pay a teenager to take my order with a judgemental expression. I hate self checkouts, I hate self order kiosks, no I do not want to use a phone app to place my order, I just want a double cheeseburger with no pickles GODAMMIT
I can't use the mobile app because my kid wants a cheeseburger happy meal and it's impossible to order on the app. Try it! It won't let you at all.
Technically, cheeseburger happy meals are no longer on the menu because they've decided it has too many calories. If you go there and ask for one, of course, they will add a slice of cheese to a hamburger happy meal. But using the app to order one is a bridge too far, I guess.
When it comes down to it, though, we shouldn't eat that crap anyway.
I checked, just for you. You can pick the hamburger happy meal and add cheese.
AI so bad it can’t get your burger order right.
No wonder people are sinking hundreds of billions into it. As opposed to, say, education.
Why would we need education if there aren't going to be any jobs to do?
It’s one of those mysteries. Maybe we should ask an educated person.
They've redirected your call to an untrained AI that just keeps saying "Hello??? Hello??? Hello???"
Because thats all it ever hears before people hang up on it. So thats sll the language they know.
It's McDonald's, no amount of humans or technology will get your order right.
I stopped going to BK because they ALWAYS messed up my order. I finally had it and never went back. I bet the ai is more competent than my local BK. What makes this story more sad is I rarely get fast food, mainly as a treat, and fucking BK always messed it up.
Still order like grandpa. I go in and want to talk to a human and order. I hate those gross ass touchscreens. I am probably a minority especially in my age group and working in tech
I am a touch screen enjoyer. At least in theory. I like having time to browse, look at pictures, easy access to customization options and most importantly no feeling of pressure. I am not spending a cashier's time and potentially blocking someone behind me (at least there is usually less of a line for the self-ordering).
However there are negatives for sure. My biggest annoyance is that these devices are often annoyingly slow and unresponsive. They just display a tiny bit of text and images, they should switch between screens at 60fps, not 2s per click. Also if I know what I want it is often faster to tell the cashier and let them enter the order (on their more expert-optimized and less laggy keypad).
Also, explicit confirmation of your customizations and of your order. You can double check yourself to make sure it's all correct before submitting the order while the distracted and overworked employee at the counter could hit the wrong button or skip a customization and you often wouldn't know until you receive the wrong item. Then you have to create more work for the workers to get your order remade.
This is why I tend to just use the mobile apps for places to order. Not laggy and gives the benefits you mentioned of using a touch screen kiosk. A lot of them you don't even need an account to use the app which is nice if that's something that bothers you.
Yeah, I like this style but don't want their apps installed on my phone. A few places have mobile sites which is excellent, I know what access it has and it is shut down completely when I close the tab.
The apps are super slow though. Like I don't need a 5 second animation of bouncing fries every time I do anything. Dunkin is another offender.
There's a reason everyone and their brother want you to install an app these days.
Always wondered why anyone would rather talk to a person than take their time, have a nice overview of the menu, and pay in advance. I guess they are gross though.
The only time I would rather not talk to a person is if the accent causes a language barrier. Otherwise 9 times out of 10 a person is going to understand what you want better especially if it's a customization issue
A lot of people seem to be misinterpreting the headline given the content of the article:
It told Restaurant Business it was testing whether the voice ordering chatbot could speed up service and that the test left it confident “that a voice-ordering solution for drive-thru will be part of our restaurants’ future.”
This is just saying that they are ending their 2021 partnership with IBM for AI drive thru.
Not that they are abandoning AI for drive thru.
I suspect that even if they were abandoning future plans for AI drive through ordering, they wouldn’t say they were. Saying you’re not doing anything with AI might actually hurt a companies share price right now.
I actually went to a mcdonalds that did this. It was overall way more slow and annoying. I would be willing to make that concession if knew that it was something to worked towards a better future for humans, but all its means is that someone is getting fired under capitalism. Also it failed to understand if I wanted sauce and just referred me to someone actually working.
I've heard a few instances in which "AI" is just a bunch people responding to a voice to text feed in the Philippines.
So much of this isn't really technology. It's just a new kind of service sector outsourcing.
Amazons Mechanical turk in a nutshell
I think McDs always planned to roll out remote customer service to really maximize capitalism. And wrapping it under AI because that's a trendy buzzword!
Maybe it's just me, maybe I'm getting old. But I want to order through a person. Not a touchscreen and not AI.
I feel like society is slowly removing humans from our everyday interactions and I don't like it.
I like the touch screen ordering systems, but thats probably just because im autistic and find human interaction tough :p Im glad its an option, but it shouldnt be the only one for accessibility reasons.
I love ordering through touch screens. No mis hearing and everything goes much quicker.
The added value of that human interaction for me personally is 0.
I just don't want to talk to a robot. Not over the phone, not in a drive-through.
I wouldn't mind letting a "robot" do that kind of work. In a perfect world that would mean less work. In the real world it means they van fire some people and make even more money. But then again, i would never eat at McDonald's anyway, so it's hard to boycott
Two stories like this--as in, "oops AI sucks actually", in about as many weeks. (The other one was about Amazon shutting down their Just Walk Out mechanical turk nonsense.)
I think we're starting to see the tide turn against Altman's big con.
I liked this quote BTW:
the test left it confident “that a voice-ordering solution for drive-thru will be part of our restaurants’ future.”
lmao you... already have one of those? So the subtext of this message is "we can't just say AI was a terrible idea but yeah, we're going back to the shit that worked before"
I wonder if they could actually get worse than the drive-thru order stations I've experienced. I work in audio, so I know what is technically possible. To talk to and trying to convey an order through a system that sounds worse than my grandmas' rotary dial telephone during a thunderstorm is a real pain for me.
Ohh damn are they going back to filthy organics?
Why not just have a touchscreen menu then? You already need large screens so people can confirm the AI recorded their order correctly and this will skip the need of a person manning the drive through menu. You could even include options to "hold the pickle", etc.
Or like a mobile app that works reliably and doesn't completely suck?
Or a mobile app that doesn't force people to waive their rights to sue on October 23rd, 2023
Supposedly AI is going to take all the jobs and yet it still can't do this task which it seems perfect for. Sure, eventually AI will get good enough to do it in the future, but there is just way too much hype given the reality of the current situation. This is a job that fast food workers are already required to do in addition to other duties, so it's not like it's labor saving from the company's perspective either.
Using AI seems extremely excessive compared to a regular interface or human.
Maybe I'm just really good with talking to robots, but the AI drivethru voice at my local McDonald's is way, way, way more accurate than basically all of the employees they used to have running it before. A few times it's been down for whatever reason and an actual human takes my order and I remember how shit they are at their jobs when they get my order wrong yet again, or can't hear me, or talk with gum in their mouths or whatever.
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
