69% of French small-business owners want AI agents, 8% use them, and only 6% would let them run unchecked
An OpinionWay survey for Alibaba.com of 501 small-business owners in France, published on 5 October 2026, shows appetite without trust: 53% name data security as the first obstacle.
The survey, run by OpinionWay for Alibaba.com among 501 small-business owners in France, shows a clear gap: 69% would like AI agents to assist them in at least one area, 8% have already tried or adopted the technology, and only 45% have heard of agentic AI. On supervision, 19% want strict human oversight against 6% who would fully delegate some functions. The obstacles: data security (53%), doubt about the quality of the work (39%), not knowing the benefits (35%) and lacking in-house skills (28%). Customer service ranks third among the uses people want (18%), behind communication (28%) and marketing (27%). As for expected benefits, 39% hope for a better work-life balance and 34% for time on what matters most.
For a network of branches, these figures are visible at the front desk: the same questions come back every day (opening hours, documents to bring, mail pick-up) and eat into the team's time. An assistant can absorb them, provided the owner knows what it does, where the data goes and who takes over. The survey does not say owners reject AI; it says they expect it to prepare, and a person to decide.
For AppH
- AppH's reception assistant answers the usual questions from the information the branch has published (prices, documents, opening hours) and hands over to the team for anything outside that scope. The team sees what the assistant passes on.
- Human control is not optional: the assistant commits neither the branch nor the client to any decision, and a sensitive outgoing message goes out only after a person at the branch approves it.
Against / the honest limit
- On data security, the survey's first obstacle, the honest answer is nuanced: the application and the data are hosted in France, but the AI model that writes the answers is Anthropic's, in the United States. An owner is entitled to know that before signing.
- A survey of 501 owners, commissioned by a platform that sells to small businesses, measures stated intentions, not results. And 8% of users proves nothing about what an assistant actually resolves: that is what we measure during a pilot.
The gap between 69% and 8% closes with clarity, not with more technology: what the tool does, what it does not do, who is in control. Our rule does not change: the assistant prepares and informs, a person decides.
Reviewed by a human at AppH