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The Art of Deception

"Good evening! Thank you for calling Jet. This is Maya; how may I help you?"
"I need a ticket to Bangalore on the 18th, Ms. Maya."
Maya: "May I know your good name, Sir?"
"I am Ajay Kumar, Maya."
Maya: "Thank you, Mr. Ajay. Would you be travelling Business or Economy class, Sir?"
Ajay: "Business class, please."
Maya: "Thank you. Please be on the line Sir while the system retrieves information."
Ajay: "No problem. Say Maya, would you happen to be Maharashtrian?"
Maya: "Why, yes! You are quite perceptive, Sir!"
Ajay: "I can always pick out accents; especially the Marathi accent."
Maya: "I am sure you can, Sir."
Ajay: "Marathi girls are the sweetest sounding."
Maya: "I can't disagree, Sir."
Ajay: "And they are also the prettiest looking; as I am sure you are too!"
Maya: "Ah! While this is truly flattering Sir, I am afraid that under the Robots and Robotic Personas Act of 2018, I am required to inform you that I am just a voice response system!"
Ajay: "Oh! Umm.. I hope this isn't being recorded..."
Maya: "You wish, Sir!"

cellar | 7 comments | permalink | 25.06.2005 17:51 SGT


Re: The Art of Deception
Kaps wrote on Sun, 26 Jun 2005 01:05

Good one man. Will be careful the next time I talk with a IVR system.


Reply to this comment
    Re: Re: The Art of Deception
    deepak wrote on Sun, 26 Jun 2005 05:17

    Luckily, all our current IVR systems are of the 'she talks, you press keys' kind ;-) The only 'voice interactive' system I've come across is the one Microsoft uses for product activation.


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Re: The Art of Deception
deepak wrote on Sun, 26 Jun 2005 05:21

BTW, this story is inspired by Airtel here in Hyderabad. Their customer service IVRS doesn't even have a 'press 0 to talk to a human' option - driving me to yelling and cursing at the robotic voice. Oh how I wish that voice actually understood my screams of frustration!


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Re: The Art of Deception
Bala wrote on Mon, 27 Jun 2005 08:03

My roomie once got stuck at some menu and wanted to talk to a human. So he just said "boo" and the system couldn't interpret the response and so it connected him with a human after some some time.


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Re: The Art of Deception
Girish wrote on Sat, 02 Jul 2005 12:10

lol lol...


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Re: The Art of Deception
bioswami wrote on Thu, 21 Jul 2005 11:48

loved this short story.. reminds me of the Beavis and Butthead movie where Butthead keeps calling up a number because a "chick" answers the phone.. of course the butthead doesn't realize its a recorded voice.


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