this post was submitted on 10 Jul 2024
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If it worked for most shit and escalated to a human when it actually needed to, reliably, I'd be fine with it.
I don't believe there's a realistic chance that there's a lot of overlap between the people willing to invest to actually do it properly and the people paying for AI instead of people though.
I get one of those meal kit delivery services. Every few weeks I'll go to their AI customer support and ask for cancellation and it'll give me discounts on upcoming orders. I keep the service at about 40% off at all times. Also when there's a problem with the order the chat bot just tosses me a discount. Cases like this are perfect for AI customer service.
Edit
Wow this blew up in a weird way. Just to be clear on a few points:
With the discount I pay $87 Canadian which is $76 untaxed or about $55usd. I also pay for this service using gift cards from Costco that are 20% off ($100 for $80) bringing that $55 weekly cost down to about $44. For 6 different dinners for me and my wife delivered to my front door every Monday. With crazy grocery prices where I live I cannot come close to beating that without giving up something. I won't eat the same thing every night (Sunday meal prep bros, don't at me), I don't want to expend the mental energy gathering recipes and ingredients but I do enjoy cooking a lot. It's something at the end of the day I can do with my hands free of screens. At regular price this was worth it to me, at 40% off it's actually saving me money. If they're still making money shipping this big box off food to me on a weekly basis, then good for them, we're both coming out on top.
Except they're selling you the kit at waaaay over cost in the first place, so they're still making money off of you. I promise you they are aware of the "glitch", and are not ignoring it out of the kindness of their hearts.
(not criticising you for using the service, if it works for you go for it and get those discounts, but don't let them manipulate you in to thinking you've got one over on them, they 100% account for this kind of thing and are still making money)
If X number of people pay full price and only Y number people go through the hoops of getting a discount the company comes out ahead!
It's worse then that. They're actively profiting from that discount rate, meaning they're ludicrously profiting from everyone who doesn't spend half their life getting discount codes (the cost of convenience)
I mean most products you'd sell you're hopefully making at least 40% profit margin so everyone would still be making money. They're just banking on you sticking around and not canceling. lots of money > some money > no money
How is 2 minutes with a chat bot half of someone's life?
We humans sometimes use a rhetorical device called "hyperbole" where we use exaggeration to emphasize our point, and it's usually not meant to be taken literally. Welcome to the planet, hope you enjoy your stay.
Yes but the point you're trying to get across is this is a huge amount of effort when it's really trivial.
While I wish you a happy and healthy life, I do hope you get to experience the joys of the US Healthcare system some day to broaden your limited horizons.
Guess I'll die.
It's cumulative dude
Yea but it works out to $87 (Canadian) for 6 different nights of meals for 2 people. Delivered to my door. I suspect their angle is using this to just keep you from churning at a loss in hopes of just keeping you around in case you go back to paying regular price. The amount of meat, vegetables and dairy in the box along with cost of shipping and paying people to assemble this order, the cost has to be damn near $87 if not a little over.
Like I said, I don't criticise anyone for using the service, and the more affordable it is, the better, but trust that they are definitely not working at a loss, in the same way supermarkets, that would probably still charge less for the same items, do - by making you believe they're selling to you at just about what it costs them to get by, when they are selling it to you for significantly more.