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I am certainly not an expert but I agree a lot with your sentiment about the hubris - but the problem as presented in the article makes no sense to me. If you

I am certainly not an expert but I agree a lot with your sentiment about the hubris - but the problem as presented in the article makes no sense to me. If you see a value need for a receptionist, and you suspect that it is costing you thousands of dollars, wouldn't a normal response be, "I should think about hiring someone," rather than turning to an unproven, untested solution like this and leaving your business at the hands of how correct it is? I just cannot understand this line of thinking at all, reaching for a tool that would probably do a worse job than a human would do. Is it not wanting to hire? Not wanting to manage? Hype cycle? Where does this urge come from?

kolinko 7mo ago
Aside from a cost? It's also managing the actual human being, and making sure they have enough work. If the place has 5-10 calls a day, then it's pointless to hire receptionist that will do nothing for 1 hour, and then get 2 minutes chat. It used to be pointless to build software to do that, but since claude code it's cheap enough to make sense.
- skeeter2020 7mo ago
  receptionist as a service has been a thing for like... forever. You are never going to solve the problem of accurately estimating and quoting with AI or an answering service, so pay for someone to answer the phone and take down the details; have a mechanic or trained service rep review and estimate. Cheap code that doesn't solve the problem is not cheap.
  - eucyclos 7mo ago
    Couldn't an ai take down the details and pass it to a mechanic or trained service rep?
    - ssl-3 7mo ago
      Yes, of course. The bot can request information and the customer can provide it if they feel like it, and then someone qualified can call them back when they have their hands free. But there's no bot, per se, needed at all. An answering machine from 1993 can do this same information-gathering job. :)
      - camillomiller 7mo ago
        I can see a useful simple case of structuring a good answering system and then using AI to do STT then using Claude to structure the callback data
        ssl-3 7mo ago
        Good point. So update the device from 1993's new-fangled digital answering machine to 2009's Google Voice, and have it do the transcription from voicemail to text. Someone will still have to call Bill back about his Honda (which is actually the Kia he bought for his daughter -- Bill is not a very technical guy these days[1] and he confuses such concepts regularly) in order to get any trading of money for services done. It doesn't take an LLM to get there, and Bill would probably prefer to avoid being frustrated by the bot's insistent nature. [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47356166 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47356166
        camillomiller 7mo ago
        Look, you‘re kicking an open door. I think LLMs applied like this are just a layer of complexity that os mostly replacing lower level programming solutions that could do the same thing
        Mrngl1991 7mo ago
        The transcription + callback loop is honestly underrated. Most of the value here is just capturing intent accurately ("Honda" vs "Kia" aside) so the mechanic can prioritize callbacks. A dumb voicemail-to-text pipeline handles that fine. The LLM layer adds complexity without solving the actual bottleneck, which is someone qualified picking up the phone.
- deanputney 7mo ago
  If someone put on their website and voicemail that they were available for calls only from 8-10am (for example), or that they would return my call at that time, I'd make a point to call them then. It's reasonable that people are busy too.
fragmede 7mo ago
I'm projecting, but I think you're right. Not wanting to manage is probably a large driver. I can imagine that if you've dealt with messy humans before, that a robot receptionist that's not going to show up late, call out when hungover, need an advance for a family member's surgery and then quit, is quite attractive.
- loloquwowndueo 7mo ago
  Until the robot breaks for reasons unknown and you have to pay for expensive engineering time to fix it. Surprise, since the engineer vibe coded the whole thing, he also has no idea how to fix it except to get the AI to try.
nmstoker 7mo ago
To take this further, if the focus really is the "luxury" part of the market, how do they expect this sort of response to go down well with customers?! If someone is interested in paying luxury size fees, do they really want some cobbled together chatbot? I say this as an advocate for (high quality) chatbots for various practical needs, but it just seems like it is misunderstanding the customers (or maybe luxury is a bit of a loose term new in the area this mechanic works in?)
- Fomite 7mo ago
  Using AI tells me you don't care about the quality of your service.
  - nmstoker 7mo ago
    Or maybe customer appetite can be markedly different depending on context.
- massysett 7mo ago
  These customers own expensive cars - or at least, cars that were expensive when they were new. The car might now be ten years old or more, and the owner bought it used. They want a prestige marque, but the customer does not have the money to buy a new prestige car. So they are looking to save on service. All the time I see cars with expensive names - BMW, Mercedes Benz - broken down on the side of the road, while old Hondas and Toyotas keep cruising by. Those are the customers for this shop: they spent all their money buying an expensive used car, and now they can't afford to maintain it and fix looming problems; meanwhile the Toyota or Hyundai driver gets maintenance and maybe even takes it to the dealer for it. A mechanic like this can't afford to hire someone to answer the phone. Such a person is expensive, and these customers want rock-bottom prices despite the car being expensive. So a chatbot is good enough and better than nothing.
  - ninalanyon 7mo ago
    The most trustworthy mechanic I used in England had an appointment book pretty much full for four months in advance. He didn't answer the phone, didn't have a computer, just a desk diary. If you wanted him to work on your car you turned up at his workshop and spoke to him. If you were willing to wait until he'd finished whatever thing he was doing he'd take a quick look at your car and suggest a course of action. And despite his full order book if something looked urgent enough and small enough he'd fit you in quite quickly. He charged reasonable prices, but definitely not rock bottom. He had no need to compete with the bottom feeders because every customer acted as his public relations agent. How would a chatbot help?
kcexn 7mo ago
Isn't this the fundamental problem of all AI chatbots? If the problem is costing thousands of dollars (a week?), why not hire a person? If it's not costing thousands of dollars, why would I hire a software engineer to build this for me.
- lovich 7mo ago
  Because the capital owning class in America commonly has an aversion to labor. Labor is other humans and all their social hierarchy monkey brain bullshit activates in a way that a machine doesn’t. That’s why you’ll see companies spending equivalent or even slightly more money for a tool to do a job over a human being.
  - eru 7mo ago
    The US ain't special. And in fact they are more likely to use more labour. Have a look at US Walmart vs German Aldi for how that looks like.
    - nextaccountic 7mo ago
      Walmart employs this amount of workers only because it is subsided by food stamps and other government assistance. The minute they were forced to actually pay for the labor they employ would fire a lot of people https://old.reddit.com/r/IsItBullshit/comments/1eftcuc/isitbullshit_60_of_walmart_employees_are_on_food/lfni5ao/ https://old.reddit.com/r/IsItBullshit/comments/1eftcuc/isitb... Actually a lot of US companies rely on this https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/mar/04/workers-medicaid-snap-low-pay https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/mar/04/workers-med...
      - Jensson 7mo ago
        > Walmart employs this amount of workers only because it is subsided by food stamps And then those food stamps are used at Walmart, its a win win for Walmart and Walmart. No other country gives their poor food stamps instead of money, I wonder why?
deleted 7mo ago
[deleted]
6510 7mo ago
You'd be surprised how many businesses don't answer their phone or chose not to answer based on who is calling.
eru 7mo ago
> If you see a value need for a receptionist, and you suspect that it is costing you thousands of dollars, wouldn't a normal response be, "I should think about hiring someone," [...] If you only have thousands of dollars is savings from the move, hiring someone might be too expensive.
heavyset_go 7mo ago
> Where does this urge come from? Business owners tend to resent having to rely on and pay their workers. Many of them believe people should line up and volunteer/be forced to work at their companies for free, the fact that they have to pay them is an insult. They need workers, but workers are not worthy of being needed by them, or paid, so they look for any out at all.
- camillomiller 7mo ago
  The word you’re looking for is greed. These systems are greed enablers. The narrative used to pump them plays on greed. And so on. Hiring a person for the job is 3000$ per month? Great let’s try to do this with 500$ and a tangle of vibecoded toothpick bridges! For a luxury service with generous margins this is a failure-prone mentality.
  - heavyset_go 7mo ago
    They'd still try to replace workers, even if their attempted route of automation cost them more than hiring employees would, because of their resentment towards them
tmountain 7mo ago
When AI is your hammer, everything looks like a nail.
deadbabe 7mo ago
The cost of a few mistakes now and then is cheaper than hiring a full time receptionist and even paying their healthcare.

kolinko 7mo ago

Aside from a cost? It's also managing the actual human being, and making sure they have enough work. If the place has 5-10 calls a day, then it's pointless to hire receptionist that will do nothing for 1 hour, and then get 2 minutes chat. It used to be pointless to build software to do that, but since claude code it's cheap enough to make sense.

skeeter2020 7mo ago
receptionist as a service has been a thing for like... forever. You are never going to solve the problem of accurately estimating and quoting with AI or an answering service, so pay for someone to answer the phone and take down the details; have a mechanic or trained service rep review and estimate. Cheap code that doesn't solve the problem is not cheap.
- eucyclos 7mo ago
  Couldn't an ai take down the details and pass it to a mechanic or trained service rep?
  - ssl-3 7mo ago
    Yes, of course. The bot can request information and the customer can provide it if they feel like it, and then someone qualified can call them back when they have their hands free. But there's no bot, per se, needed at all. An answering machine from 1993 can do this same information-gathering job. :)
    - camillomiller 7mo ago
      I can see a useful simple case of structuring a good answering system and then using AI to do STT then using Claude to structure the callback data
      - ssl-3 7mo ago
        Good point. So update the device from 1993's new-fangled digital answering machine to 2009's Google Voice, and have it do the transcription from voicemail to text. Someone will still have to call Bill back about his Honda (which is actually the Kia he bought for his daughter -- Bill is not a very technical guy these days[1] and he confuses such concepts regularly) in order to get any trading of money for services done. It doesn't take an LLM to get there, and Bill would probably prefer to avoid being frustrated by the bot's insistent nature. [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47356166 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47356166
        camillomiller 7mo ago
        Look, you‘re kicking an open door. I think LLMs applied like this are just a layer of complexity that os mostly replacing lower level programming solutions that could do the same thing
        Mrngl1991 7mo ago
        The transcription + callback loop is honestly underrated. Most of the value here is just capturing intent accurately ("Honda" vs "Kia" aside) so the mechanic can prioritize callbacks. A dumb voicemail-to-text pipeline handles that fine. The LLM layer adds complexity without solving the actual bottleneck, which is someone qualified picking up the phone.
deanputney 7mo ago
If someone put on their website and voicemail that they were available for calls only from 8-10am (for example), or that they would return my call at that time, I'd make a point to call them then. It's reasonable that people are busy too.

fragmede 7mo ago

I'm projecting, but I think you're right. Not wanting to manage is probably a large driver. I can imagine that if you've dealt with messy humans before, that a robot receptionist that's not going to show up late, call out when hungover, need an advance for a family member's surgery and then quit, is quite attractive.

loloquwowndueo 7mo ago
Until the robot breaks for reasons unknown and you have to pay for expensive engineering time to fix it. Surprise, since the engineer vibe coded the whole thing, he also has no idea how to fix it except to get the AI to try.

nmstoker 7mo ago

To take this further, if the focus really is the "luxury" part of the market, how do they expect this sort of response to go down well with customers?! If someone is interested in paying luxury size fees, do they really want some cobbled together chatbot? I say this as an advocate for (high quality) chatbots for various practical needs, but it just seems like it is misunderstanding the customers (or maybe luxury is a bit of a loose term new in the area this mechanic works in?)

Fomite 7mo ago
Using AI tells me you don't care about the quality of your service.
- nmstoker 7mo ago
  Or maybe customer appetite can be markedly different depending on context.
massysett 7mo ago
These customers own expensive cars - or at least, cars that were expensive when they were new. The car might now be ten years old or more, and the owner bought it used. They want a prestige marque, but the customer does not have the money to buy a new prestige car. So they are looking to save on service. All the time I see cars with expensive names - BMW, Mercedes Benz - broken down on the side of the road, while old Hondas and Toyotas keep cruising by. Those are the customers for this shop: they spent all their money buying an expensive used car, and now they can't afford to maintain it and fix looming problems; meanwhile the Toyota or Hyundai driver gets maintenance and maybe even takes it to the dealer for it. A mechanic like this can't afford to hire someone to answer the phone. Such a person is expensive, and these customers want rock-bottom prices despite the car being expensive. So a chatbot is good enough and better than nothing.
- ninalanyon 7mo ago
  The most trustworthy mechanic I used in England had an appointment book pretty much full for four months in advance. He didn't answer the phone, didn't have a computer, just a desk diary. If you wanted him to work on your car you turned up at his workshop and spoke to him. If you were willing to wait until he'd finished whatever thing he was doing he'd take a quick look at your car and suggest a course of action. And despite his full order book if something looked urgent enough and small enough he'd fit you in quite quickly. He charged reasonable prices, but definitely not rock bottom. He had no need to compete with the bottom feeders because every customer acted as his public relations agent. How would a chatbot help?

kcexn 7mo ago

Isn't this the fundamental problem of all AI chatbots? If the problem is costing thousands of dollars (a week?), why not hire a person? If it's not costing thousands of dollars, why would I hire a software engineer to build this for me.

lovich 7mo ago
Because the capital owning class in America commonly has an aversion to labor. Labor is other humans and all their social hierarchy monkey brain bullshit activates in a way that a machine doesn’t. That’s why you’ll see companies spending equivalent or even slightly more money for a tool to do a job over a human being.
- eru 7mo ago
  The US ain't special. And in fact they are more likely to use more labour. Have a look at US Walmart vs German Aldi for how that looks like.
  - nextaccountic 7mo ago
    Walmart employs this amount of workers only because it is subsided by food stamps and other government assistance. The minute they were forced to actually pay for the labor they employ would fire a lot of people https://old.reddit.com/r/IsItBullshit/comments/1eftcuc/isitbullshit_60_of_walmart_employees_are_on_food/lfni5ao/ https://old.reddit.com/r/IsItBullshit/comments/1eftcuc/isitb... Actually a lot of US companies rely on this https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/mar/04/workers-medicaid-snap-low-pay https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/mar/04/workers-med...
    - Jensson 7mo ago
      > Walmart employs this amount of workers only because it is subsided by food stamps And then those food stamps are used at Walmart, its a win win for Walmart and Walmart. No other country gives their poor food stamps instead of money, I wonder why?

deleted 7mo ago

[deleted]

6510 7mo ago

You'd be surprised how many businesses don't answer their phone or chose not to answer based on who is calling.

eru 7mo ago

> If you see a value need for a receptionist, and you suspect that it is costing you thousands of dollars, wouldn't a normal response be, "I should think about hiring someone," [...] If you only have thousands of dollars is savings from the move, hiring someone might be too expensive.

heavyset_go 7mo ago

> Where does this urge come from? Business owners tend to resent having to rely on and pay their workers. Many of them believe people should line up and volunteer/be forced to work at their companies for free, the fact that they have to pay them is an insult. They need workers, but workers are not worthy of being needed by them, or paid, so they look for any out at all.

camillomiller 7mo ago
The word you’re looking for is greed. These systems are greed enablers. The narrative used to pump them plays on greed. And so on. Hiring a person for the job is 3000$ per month? Great let’s try to do this with 500$ and a tangle of vibecoded toothpick bridges! For a luxury service with generous margins this is a failure-prone mentality.
- heavyset_go 7mo ago
  They'd still try to replace workers, even if their attempted route of automation cost them more than hiring employees would, because of their resentment towards them

tmountain 7mo ago

When AI is your hammer, everything looks like a nail.

deadbabe 7mo ago

The cost of a few mistakes now and then is cheaper than hiring a full time receptionist and even paying their healthcare.