{"id":309337,"date":"2026-03-02T11:58:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-02T11:58:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/309337\/"},"modified":"2026-03-02T11:58:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-02T11:58:08","slug":"burger-king-launches-ai-bot-to-monitor-worker-courtesy-in-us-trial-rollout","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/309337\/","title":{"rendered":"Burger King launches AI bot to monitor worker courtesy in US trial rollout"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Guardian reported the voice-enabled chatbot \u2013 created by OpenAI, which developed ChatGPT \u2013 has been configured to detect pleasantries such as \u201cwelcome\u201d, \u201cplease\u201d and \u201cthank you\u201d.<\/p>\n

The burger chain noted the technology was not intended to record conversations or assess employees individually, but rather to \u201chelp managers understand overall service patterns\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"SomeSome social media users expressed concerns that a new Burger King AI trial breached staff privacy. Photo \/ 123rf<\/p>\n

However, the trial, which analyses audio from drive-thru interactions, has drawn an overwhelmingly negative response on social media, with some users describing it as \u201cgross\u201d and \u201cpeak late-stage corporate behaviour\u201d.<\/p>\n

The BBC reported that critics raised privacy concerns, arguing the software was overreaching.<\/p>\n

A promotional video for the programme shows \u201cPatty\u201d alerting a staff member that the Diet Coke supply in a soda fountain is low. <\/p>\n

In another clip, the AI assistant tells a worker: \u201cThe team\u2019s friendliness scores this morning were the highest this week.\u201d <\/p>\n

A third video shows a cook asking \u201cPatty\u201d for help recalling a recipe.<\/p>\n

The restaurant said the AI assistant wasn\u2019t designed to force staff to follow scripts or listen in on private conversations, NBC News reported.<\/p>\n

Burger King\u2019s chief digital officer Thibault Roux said: \u201cIt\u2019s really a coaching tool. To help you as an employee become more hospitable, and we\u2019re going to help you also with certain operation flaws that may occur that can be a little bit complex.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2024, the Herald reported Burger King was the first fast-food chain in New Zealand to use AI<\/a> in its stores with four Auckland drive-thrus fully AI-operated and a conversational chatbot taking customer orders.<\/p>\n

Sign up to Herald Premium Editor\u2019s Picks<\/a>, delivered straight to your inbox every Friday. Editor-in-Chief Murray Kirkness picks the week\u2019s best features, interviews and investigations. Sign up for Herald Premium here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Guardian reported the voice-enabled chatbot \u2013 created by OpenAI, which developed ChatGPT \u2013 has been configured to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":309338,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[365,192,363,364,37631,126397,18327,36595,168667,93282,6852,53840,78,9860,1739,61386,58368,111,139,69,16493,2552,9939,145,8229,61,54,9938,3040,1533,12767,4478],"class_list":["post-309337","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-are","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-assess","tag-bot","tag-bots","tag-burger","tag-courteous","tag-courtesy","tag-customer","tag-friendly","tag-in","tag-king","tag-launches","tag-monitor","tag-monitored","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-rollout","tag-service","tag-states","tag-technology","tag-they","tag-to","tag-trial","tag-united","tag-us","tag-will","tag-worker","tag-workers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309337","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=309337"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309337\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/309338"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=309337"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=309337"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=309337"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}