[BikerJoe]

Chili’s has touch screen terminals where I usually eat dinner. I pay my check directly. Drink re-order and games for a fee as well.

How quickly things change. Only a few years ago, every industry survey reported that a significant majority of people wanted HUMANS providing the service. Trust me, the restaurant industries could have done this 10 yrs. ago, but explicitly chose not to.

[Resolute Conservative]

I felt the same way until recently. It seems the average waiter/food order person cannot understand English (and not just foreigners is the sad part) and they screw my order 1/3 of the time.

[Myrddin]

I automated 4 activities that comprised 80% of the service
rep workload in 1986. A big financial impact at PacBell.
There was room to automate more. Much additional automation
was applied to less publicly visible processes.