Maahir Sharma’s AI Agent Wins $5 Hotel Discount After Being Asked if It Was AI
Updated
Updated · Business Insider · Jun 19
Maahir Sharma’s AI Agent Wins $5 Hotel Discount After Being Asked if It Was AI
3 articles · Updated · Business Insider · Jun 19
Summary
$108 became $103 when an AI phone agent built by Dublin software engineer Maahir Sharma persuaded a U.S. hotel to cut its one-night rate, even after the staffer asked whether the caller was AI.
The test was designed to see whether an agent could manage real conversations, handle interruptions and negotiate politely using Sharma’s travel dates, budget preferences and hotel-specific prompts.
Three days of building and about a week of prompt tuning improved the tool’s performance after early versions sounded robotic, talked too long and pushed for discounts too quickly.
Across about 10 hotel calls over multiple nights, the agent secured one $5 discount and found another cash-payment saving, though Sharma said the point was automating a tedious booking task rather than saving a few dollars.