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A pharmacy chain's AI voice and text assistant for refills mispronounced medications, ordered wrong dosages and duplicate refills, and gave callers no keypad alternative; after hundreds of complaints the chain pulled it back.
TierAfter complaints, inbound calls went back to the touch-tone system and the AI was kept only for opt-in outbound texts. How tiers are assigned.
Kinney Drugs deployed 'Burt', an AI assistant built by Synerio, in May 2026 to handle prescription and refill communication. VTDigger reported in July 2026 that customers heard garbled medication names, received wrong dosages and refills they did not need, and in one case accumulated four bottles of a twice-weekly drug; there was no keypad option, so patients had to talk to the AI to get refills. In August 2026 WCAX reported that after hundreds of complaints Kinney returned inbound calls to its touch-tone system and kept the AI only for opt-in outbound refill texts.[1,2]
Wrong and duplicate refills reported; no injury documented.
All incidents · Models & agents · Human handoff
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