Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Air Canada is responsible for chatbot's mistake: B.C. tribunal

bc.ctvnews.ca

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

291–300 of 434 posts

Re: Air Canada is responsible for chatbot's mistake: B.C. tribunal

#291

Post by jowea »

steveBK123 wrote: post #260
ado__dev wrote: post #246

If I am trying to interact with a company and they direct me to their chatbot, I expect that chatbot to provide me with accurate answers 100% of the time (or to say it can't help me in the event that I ask a question that it's not meant to solve, and connect me to a representative who can). If I have to double-triple check elsewhere to make sure that the chatbot is correct, or if anything the chatbot tells me is non-…

Yes, I think people underestimate the amount of imagined LLM use cases that require accurate responses. To the point that hallucinations will cost money in fines & lawsuits. This is a new frontier in short sighted customer service staffing (non-staffing in this case). The people who are on the frontline communicating with customers can convert unhappy customers to repeat customers, or into ex-customers. There's a few…

The fines and lawsuits may be way cheaper than human staff.

Re: Air Canada is responsible for chatbot's mistake: B.C. tribunal

#292

Post by thfuran »

londons_explore wrote: post #242
ceejayoz wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Chevy dealerships had $1 bereavement Chevy Tahoes as a normal business practice, I think that one would've gone the other way. In the Air Canada case, it was a clear good-faith effort to understand the rules of a fare he was legitimately entitled to.

I think eventually courts will decide that whatever a chatbot or employee says while working for the company is binding on the company, as long as there was no malicious intent on either the part of the employee or the customer.

If it hasn't happened yet for employees, why do you think it will happen for chatbots?

Re: Air Canada is responsible for chatbot's mistake: B.C. tribunal

#293

Post by joecool1029 »

CamelCaseName wrote: post #253

The worst case for these airlines is always just a refund for whatever money they took in the first place. Someone could make a killing making a fake airline, taking payments for flights, and then cancelling every single flight and only refunding the people who fight back hard enough.

> Someone could make a killing making a fake airline, taking payments for flights, and then cancelling every single flight and only refunding the people who fight back hard enough.

They did, it's called Air Canada. I was scammed out of Japan tickets by them during COVID, they have still not refunded me and they expired the credit for the tickets. I have tried every customer support avenue to no avail. It's a scam airline.

Re: Air Canada is responsible for chatbot's mistake: B.C. tribunal

#294

Post by jorisboris »

jowea wrote: post #291
steveBK123 wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I think people underestimate the amount of imagined LLM use cases that require accurate responses. To the point that hallucinations will cost money in fines & lawsuits. This is a new frontier in short sighted customer service staffing (non-staffing in this case). The people who are on the frontline communicating with customers can convert unhappy customers to repeat customers, or into ex-customers. There's a few…

The fines and lawsuits may be way cheaper than human staff.

Especially once we have ai lawyers ;)

Re: Air Canada is responsible for chatbot's mistake: B.C. tribunal

#295

Post by Retric »

canadiantim wrote: post #280
m_0x wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you can't trust it 99% of the time A chatbot should be either 100% or 0%. Companies should not replace humans with faulty technology.

but humans aren't 100% either... seems ridiculous to demand 100% from any implementation

A company is partially bound by their representatives actions, so humans can hit 100% despite making mistakes.

This is simply applying the exact same standards to a chat bot.

Re: Air Canada is responsible for chatbot's mistake: B.C. tribunal

#296

Post by TechSquidTV »

steveBK123 wrote: post #260
ado__dev wrote: post #246

If I am trying to interact with a company and they direct me to their chatbot, I expect that chatbot to provide me with accurate answers 100% of the time (or to say it can't help me in the event that I ask a question that it's not meant to solve, and connect me to a representative who can). If I have to double-triple check elsewhere to make sure that the chatbot is correct, or if anything the chatbot tells me is non-…

Yes, I think people underestimate the amount of imagined LLM use cases that require accurate responses. To the point that hallucinations will cost money in fines & lawsuits. This is a new frontier in short sighted customer service staffing (non-staffing in this case). The people who are on the frontline communicating with customers can convert unhappy customers to repeat customers, or into ex-customers. There's a few…

With RAG it's entirely possible to essentially eliminate 100% of hallucinations, given you are ok with responding with "I don't know" once in a while. These situations are likely coming from poorly implemented chatbot, or they decided that "I dont know" was not acceptable, and really that should be a queue to send you to a real human.

Re: Air Canada is responsible for chatbot's mistake: B.C. tribunal

#297

Post by Invictus0 »

kevin_b_er wrote: post #259
ndjshe3838 wrote: post #226

I hate the whole attitude the industry has towards AI models, it just seems so sloppy compared to software of the past It’s like “yeah we don’t really know what it’s going to do and it might screw up but whatever just launch it” Really surprised me that so many companies are willing to jump into LLMs without any guarantee that the output won’t be something completely insane

The purpose of AI, and the entire drive of investment in it, is to eliminate labor costs. There's no other purpose. It is not to advance science or make a better world, it is to make money. That money comes by the expense of the many and the gain of a few. And there will not be new jobs to replace the ones lost. There's no more "learn to code!". They're there to replace all jobs possible, make a more unequal society,…

I agree with everything except "there will not be new jobs". There will most definitely be new jobs.

Re: Air Canada is responsible for chatbot's mistake: B.C. tribunal

#298

Post by jorisboris »

dukeyukey wrote: post #288
canadiantim wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

but humans aren't 100% either... seems ridiculous to demand 100% from any implementation

If a human customer support person told me something and I made purchases based on that, and it turned out they lied, yeah I'd want recompense for that as well. You're allowed to be wrong (AI or human), you just have to face consequences for it.

I had that once with an airline, customer rep made promises and afterwards they refused

Coincidentally the audio recording of the conversation was apparently deleted …

Re: Air Canada is responsible for chatbot's mistake: B.C. tribunal

#300

Post by [deleted] »

silisili wrote: post #224
ceejayoz wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah; this should've been well within some second-tier customer service manager's discretionary refund budget. Instead they've got a precedent-setting ruling that makes the chatbot a huge liability.

I hope they do become huge liabilities as it's irresponsible. I'm as excited as the next guy about the future, but companies shoehorning terrible "AI" to replace support channels is infuriating. The -only- good interaction I've had with a chatbot was the one Amazon uses or used to use, where you could click from a few options, and it'd just issue you a refund.

[deleted]
Post reply on HN