In a Crisis, Travel Companies Count on Humans — Not AI 

AI Summary

The travel industry's pivot to AI-driven customer service, accelerated after COVID-19 exposed infrastructure weaknesses, is faltering amid the current Middle East crisis. When real disruptions hit, companies are falling back on human agents rather than the AI tools they heavily marketed. The piece suggests AI has not yet proven itself as a reliable crisis-management solution in travel.

After Covid exposed how brittle travel's customer service infrastructure was, the industry pitched AI as the fix. Now, with the Middle East chaos, much of the tech that was supposed to help vanished from the narrative.