AI AppleCare

The Apple Store's Genius Bar used to be fantastic, back when they had the Red Telephone. Any question, no matter how technical, could get an answer in short order.

When they got rid of the Red Telephone, the Genius Bar at my local Apple Store became "take the machine into the back room, come back 5-10 minutes later and declare it unfixable, and offer a motherboard swap for 80% the cost of a brand new one".

I've never seen a support chatbot I didn't loathe. I had to call one just this morning, and was even worse than I'd remembered. I think Apple underestimates how much people hate having to talk to an AI.

The only way I can see such a move *not* backfiring is if they also added chatbot support to the *user* side of things. I want to type into my Mac "The left shift key on my keyboard stopped working. Call Apple for me, get them to send me a replacement, and don't talk to me again until you've printed out a return shipping label." Otherwise, they're sending the message that AI is good enough for Apple customers, but not for Apple employees.

It's not that chatbots are so great, it's that we've reached this equilibrium where chatbots have gotten so good and the incentives and training and structure of support at these companies have gotten so bad, that now sometimes the chatbot it better.

Is it better to talk to a chatbot whom you can understand and vice versa (in many languages) who can solve your problem, or talk to someone whose only power is to enter the exact same ticket the chatbot would but is more prone to mistakes?

Most companies already treat support like a burden they despise and would like to be rid of. This will make that worse in those companies, and help the companies that actually care. But those companies were already hiring competent people.

If this is used to smooth out requests at scale so small stuff gets handled quickly and easily while big stuff is reserved for qualified humans empowered to help you, great. But we don't seem to have the latter without the former as it is anyway.

As to the layoffs, it’s not clear to me whether this is Ternus reversing a Cook idea or something else.

I assume it went like this:

1. A middle manager thought “we could lay off a bunch of AppleCare employees if a chatbot can handle their jobs just as well at a fraction of the price”
2. A chatbot couldn’t handle their jobs nearly as well, at least at API prices
3. The plan to save money with LLMs got mothballed indefinitely

Many such cases.

Hate to say it but +1 for AI chatbots. I always want a human response but most support staffs are so rigidly trained that there's no hope of getting your problem solved if it isn't the kind of rudimentary problem no one reading this blog needs another person to fix for them.

Chatbots aren't necessarily great or even good but at least there's a chance of forward progress without having to escalate up three levels of support expertise and hope the connection doesn't drop along the way.

@tim To be clear, I don’t like talking to chatbots on the phone. They can be good for typing simple questions, though. I can imagine them taking off some of the first-tier load so that humans can have more time for the harder cases. Right now, when chatting with a human, it often feels like they’re doing four chats at once.

bart said: "Is it better to talk to a chatbot whom you can understand and vice versa (in many languages) who can solve your problem, or talk to someone whose only power is to enter the exact same ticket the chatbot would but is more prone to mistakes?"

Mu. That sounds like an imaginary hypothetical. Neither side of that reflects any reality I've ever experienced.

I'll take the human being who can understand me, be understood by me, use common sense, ask others for help when necessary, and apply exceptions when reasonable. Not the chatbot which fails to understand me 100% of the time, seems to have no more knowledge than the FAQ on their webpage, and rigidly applies rules even when they make no sense.

I feel like we're living different planets.

The most stupid thing about laying off Applecare Support, is that they're the biggest test audience for the ability of Apple's products to be used for remote work.

Anyone who doesn't realise, Applecare support is pretty much entirely a work from home operation; Apple equips the person with a dedicated iMac if they have a sufficient broadband connection, and space to have a desk used only for Apple's tasks, that's secure. It's not a callcentre setup.

I hear a lot of backyard chickens in places like Thailand, or the Philippines whenever I call them.