Fast-Casual Chain Chili’s Happily Demystifies Health Care for People on Twitter

Late last night, Twitter user @subtlerbutler went on a rant, seemingly about websites like Quora or Yahoo Answers, where people crowdsource their problems and wait, rather than ask a live human being:

He gave several suggestions, like call or text a friend, email somebody, post your question on Facebook, or — a crazy one for comic effect — just ask Chili’s, because “sometimes @Chilis knows.” Probably just for grins, when somebody asked what question a casual-dining restaurant chain has the answer to, he gave Chili’s one of life’s toughest:

Clearly sensing a gold mine here, whoever was on Chili’s social-media duty at the time jumped (one assumes) right onto Google, read up on it, then posted this reply:

The extremely well-placed no-nonsense answer, wholly accurate or not, quickly went viral (it’s up to around 2,000 retweets right now). It surprised people who weren’t expecting to wake up and see a chain’s Twitter account explaining insurance co-pays better than at least half of Washington could.

The “Chili’s/Wendy’s 2020” tweets began shortly after, along with a slew of new questions that ranged from really lazy (“what’s the co-pay for an ice-cold, top-shelf marg at my neighborhood chilis”) to pretty good (“how much will the average American’s health care costs increase under Graham-Cassidy?”). The big one left on everybody’s mind now: Does or doesn’t Chili’s support single payer?

Chili’s Demystifies Health Care for Baffled Twitter User