# AI Receptionist for Small Business: A Guide for Contractors

Source: https://davossystems.com/guides/ai-receptionist-for-small-business

Guide AI receptionist for small business: a guide for contractors An AI receptionist answers the calls you miss, asks the questions you set and then books the job or passes it on. Vendors charge by the minute, by the call or through a monthly plan, so compare quotes on your own call volume. Davos Systems sells one for contractors, called Answer. What is an AI receptionist? An AI receptionist is software that answers your business phone with a synthetic voice when you cannot. It greets the caller, asks the questions you set, and then takes a message, books a visit or transfers the call. For a contractor, it covers the calls that come in while you are on a roof or under a sink. It differs from voicemail because the caller talks to something that asks questions and can act on the answers. It differs from a human answering service because nobody is on the line, so what it can do depends on the rules, the calendar access and the transfer numbers you give it. How much does an AI receptionist cost? Vendors bill AI receptionists in one of three ways: per minute, per call, or a flat monthly plan that includes a set allowance of minutes with an overage rate above it. Advertised plans change often, so ask each vendor to price the number of calls you actually get before you compare them. Billing model How you are charged What to ask Per minute Every minute the AI is on the phone Are short spam calls and hang-ups billed? Per call Every call it answers, whatever the length What counts as a call: a robocall, a wrong number? Monthly plan A flat fee with an allowance of minutes What is the overage rate in your busy season? A monthly plan is easier to budget for. Per-minute and per-call billing can cost less in a slow month and more in a busy one, which for most trades is when you need the calls answered most. Is an AI receptionist worth it for a small business? It is worth it when the calls you miss turn into jobs you lose. If you answer most calls yourself, or your work is booked weeks out, a missed call costs you little. If callers want someone today and you are on a job, an answered call that books the visit is worth more than a voicemail. Before you pay for one, keep a simple log for a couple of weeks: each call you missed, whether the caller left a message, and whether you won the job when you called back. That log tells you more about your own business than any vendor's figures, and it gives you a way to check whether the service paid for itself. What should you ask before you pay for an AI receptionist? Ask what it does when a caller has an emergency, whether you keep your phone number, how it books jobs onto your calendar, whether you can hear every call, what it says when asked about prices, and how billing changes when your call volume jumps. A good vendor answers each of these in writing. Use this checklist when you compare vendors: Emergencies, such as a gas smell or a flooded basement, go straight to a person, and you choose who You keep your existing number, and the AI only picks up the calls you miss Jobs are booked into the calendar you already use, inside your service area and hours You get a written summary or a recording of every call You approve the greeting and the voice before any caller hears them It does not quote prices or diagnose problems unless you have told it exactly what to say The contract states the billing model, the overage rate and how to cancel How does Davos Systems handle the calls you miss? Davos Systems sells Answer, an AI answering service on a flat monthly plan with an allowance of conversations and an overage rate. It picks up the calls you forward, says it is a virtual assistant, checks the caller against your service area, job types and urgency, books qualified jobs into your Google Calendar and hands emergencies to your on-call people. You keep your number, and calls reach Answer by forwarding. You pick the voice and approve the greeting before any caller hears it, get a summary and transcript of every call, and Spanish-speaking callers are answered in Spanish unless you switch it off. Answer does not quote prices, diagnose problems or send text messages: it books the visit, and prices come from you on site. The price and the limits are on the Answer page . For your website, on Davos Sites Standard, a chat window on every page answers visitors from rules you approve and emails you anything outside them. It costs $1,250 to build and $97 a month. The HVAC and plumbing pages show what a phone-first site looks like for those trades. Related After-hours answering service for contractors Contractor website design Websites and Google review requests for HVAC companies Websites and Google review requests for plumbing companies Sources AI receptionist vendors bill in one of three ways: per minute, per call, or a flat monthly plan that includes a set allowance of minutes with an overage rate above it getnextphone.com , accessed 2026-09-29 .