Is AI the future of order-taking? Maybe, but that future will have to wait a little bit at McDonald’s. The fast-food giant entered into a partnership with IBM in 2021 after testing Automated Order Taking (AOT) tech at a handful of locations. In announcing the partnership, the two companies stated that “IBM’s expertise in building customer care solutions with AI and natural language processing will help scale the AOT technology across markets and tackle integrations including additional languages, dialects and menu variations.”

The AOT tech was installed at up to 100 locations but will be axed going forward. According to CNBC, the tech never conquered different accents and dialects across those McDonald’s locations.

McDonald’s will reboot the AOT program in a different way in the future, the company said, telling CNBC: “As we move forward, our work with IBM has given us the confidence that a voice ordering solution for drive-thru will be part of our restaurants’ future.”

CNBC noted that accuracy, according to reports, was in the low-to-mid 80% range but would need to be at least 95% for the technology to be viable. In December, McDonald’s announced a wide-ranging partnership with Google, leading to some speculation that Google may be the QSR’s AI provider in the future.

The New York Post shared examples of AOT fails, reporting “the gaffes included adding nine sweet teas to one customer’s order and giving another customer an ice cream cone topped with bacon.”