Fired my AI receptionist last year, ended up building full customer care AI automation for restaurants. Looking for volunteers to test it.
Heads up before anyone calls it out in the comments: I own a 3-location smash burger chain, and I hired developers to build an AI phone system after the ones we tried didn't work. Posting this because I'm looking for a few volunteers to test it out. It's free, no credit card, no commitment. Posting in this sub as I feel followers here are more new tech tolerant than in other subs.
Below is a short story how we started, why we started and why this tech stands out from 500,000 others. If you are still not interested, you can read to know why we didn't like AI receptionists.
Restaurant Background: started as a pop-up in 2023, opened our first real location Feb 2024. In 2024 we tried an AI phone answering service, turned it off a few months later. Here's why:
- You still have to listen back to recorded calls to check the AI handled things right and get a read on customer tone. Didn't save time, just moved the work around.
- When the AI got stuck it forwarded to me or a manager. That was happening on close to half the calls.
- The big feature these services push is "AI takes phone orders," but customers wouldn't give card info to a robot. They'd "order," never show up. We were seeing around 80% no-shows on AI phone orders.
Also, the "people hang up once they realize it's AI" thing that gets repeated a lot on Reddit, we never once saw it happen across thousands of calls. Might just be our customer base, but worth mentioning.
We shut it off in May 2025 and decided to build our own instead, mostly out of frustration but we believed in tech. Hired engineers and a voice actor, had a working prototype by October 2025, ran it in our own stores first, then a few friends' restaurants to stress test it and fix from their feedback, add features they would love to have etc.
What we ended up with, and how it addresses the stuff above:
- Weekly call summaries so we're not manually reviewing recordings anymore.
- Complaint detection that texts/emails a manager right away, and remembers to follow up next time that customer calls. Here's what that looks like: Resolving a Complaint (24 hours response is the restaurant setting, not us)
- Rarely forwards calls now. Most of what used to escalate was stuff like a missing item from a third-party delivery order, so now it just points them to DoorDash/Uber Eats and logs it. Example: Uber Eats Issue
- Orders get a secure payment link instead of asking for card numbers out loud, so the no-show problem basically went away. Example: Ordering
- It offers loyalty signup on calls, explains the perks. We add 100-150 members a month across our locations just from this, which we then use for promos and new menu pushes. Example: Membership Sign up
- Catering calls (which always seemed to land at 5pm mid-rush) now just get logged, with a manager calling back once they've got a minute to actually prep. Example: Catering Request
- It also handles normal day-to-day questions fine, like this parking one: Helping with parking
We're trying to get a limited voulounteer restaurants outside our own circle to run it for free and tell us honest feedback. No cost, no card, cancel anytime, no commitment.
If that's something you'd want to try, or you've just got questions, drop a comment or DM me.
Also curious if other operators have run into the same phone AI issues we did.