A modern-day odyssey through AI chatbot hellscape
Marketplace Tech
Marketplace
4.5 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 23 July 2026
⏱️ 11 minutes
🔗️ Recording | Apple Podcasts | RSS
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
A missing package can easily ruin a day, but chasing where that package went — or even a refund — is like following Odysseus on his treacherous journey.
And in the age of AI chatbots, the process is a whole lot less human.Dillon Thompson is currently on such a journey. He is looking for an e-bike that FedEx said had been delivered. In his search, Thompson found himself in the AI chatbot hellscape that customer service lines have become.
“Marketplace Tech” host Meghan McCarty Carino spoke with Thompson about his trials and tribulations as he chased his tail from company to company and chatbot to chatbot in hopes of finding his missing bike.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This Marketplace podcast is presented by Tomorrow's Cure. If our episodes on the intersection of AI and |
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| 0:24.0 | Featuring conversations with leading physicians, researchers, and medical experts, |
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| 0:39.5 | Not sure where to start? Listen to the season premiere featuring MD Anderson Radiation Physicist Dr. Page Taylor and Mayo Clinic |
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| 1:19.7 | The new version of customer service hold music is chatbot hell. From American Public Media, |
| 1:28.0 | this is Marketplace Tech. |
| 1:29.6 | I'm Megan McCarty Carino. |
| 1:40.2 | Four months ago, Dylan Thompson ordered two e-bikes, one for himself and one for his fiancé. |
| 1:46.9 | But only one e-bike ever arrived. He got a notification that the second one had been delivered. |
| 1:52.9 | But when Thompson went to look for the $1,700 package, it was nowhere to be found. |
| 1:58.9 | His quest to find the missing bike sent him on a journey |
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