# Cost of Missed Calls: What 160 Calls to HVAC Shops Showed

Source: https://davossystems.com/guides/cost-of-missed-calls-for-trade-businesses

Guide The cost of missed calls: what we found calling 93 HVAC shops In our calls to 93 well-reviewed Georgia HVAC shops, 12% missed a weekday call at 12:30 pm and 26% missed at 7:30 pm. What a miss costs you depends on three of your own numbers: calls missed each month, the share of those callers who would have booked, and your average job. How many calls does a trade business miss? In our study, 12% of calls to Georgia HVAC shops at 12:30 pm on a weekday went unanswered: voicemail, no answer, a busy line or silence. At 7:30 pm the share rose to 26%. These were established shops, each rated 4.5 stars or higher with at least 100 Google reviews. Who picked up 12:30 pm (93 calls) 5:30 pm (22 calls) 7:30 pm (39 calls) A person at the shop 54% 23% 15% A phone menu 23% 45% 33% Nobody (voicemail, no answer, busy, silence) 12% 14% 26% An AI receptionist 6% 9% 13% An answering service 5% 9% 13% The same pattern held shop by shop. We reached 39 shops at both 12:30 pm and 7:30 pm. Three of them missed the lunch call and 10 missed the evening call. None missed both, so a shop that answers at noon can still send an evening caller to voicemail. How do you work out what a missed call costs? Multiply three numbers from your own records: the calls you miss in a month, the share of those callers who would have booked a job, and your average ticket. Use your own figures rather than an industry average. A shop that books emergency repairs and one that sells planned replacements will get very different answers. Input Where to find it Missed calls per month Your phone carrier's call log, or a tally of voicemails and missed-call alerts Share who would have booked Of the callers you reached last month, how many became a job Average ticket Your invoicing or field service software, over the last few months Missed calls × booking share × average ticket gives you the monthly figure. Then lower it by the callers who leave a message and still book when you call back. Your log will show that number too: of the voicemails you returned, how many turned into work. We have not put a dollar figure on this page. Call volume, booking rates and ticket sizes vary too much from shop to shop for one number to be honest. What happens to after-hours calls today? At 7:30 pm, only 15% of our calls reached a person at the shop. A third went to a phone menu, and about a quarter got voicemail, rang out or hit a busy line. The rest, 10 of the 39 shops, reached an AI receptionist or an answering service, so some shops already pay to cover the evening. A phone menu counts as answered in the table, but it may not feel that way to someone with a broken AC. What are the options for answering them? You can answer every call yourself, forward the line to someone on call, pay a live answering service, or use an AI receptionist. Each one costs something: your evenings, a staff schedule, a monthly bill, or the setup time to teach the software your rules. Start with your missed-call count, then pick. Option What it takes Watch for Answer it yourself Your phone on, every evening Calls missed while you are on a job On-call schedule A tech who takes the phone after hours Pay for on-call time, and burnout Live answering service A monthly plan, often billed per minute or per call Agents who take a message but cannot book AI receptionist Setup of your questions, hours and calendar What it can book into, and what it hands back to you Davos Systems sells an AI receptionist for contractors called Answer . It answers calls only. It does not send texts or handle web forms, and it books into Google Calendar or Jobber. If you run an HVAC shop, our HVAC page shows how it fits with a website and review requests. How did we run the study? Between 2026-10-14 and 2026-10-19, Davos Systems placed 160 calls to the main lines of 94 Georgia HVAC shops. Each shop was rated 4.5 stars or higher with at least 100 Google reviews. Six calls failed on our side, so the results cover 154 calls to 93 shops. The 12:30 pm calls ran on a Wednesday, a Thursday and a Monday, the 5:30 pm calls on a Wednesday and a Thursday, and the 7:30 pm calls on a Friday. We sorted every call by who picked up, using the recording where the call connected: a person, a phone menu, an AI receptionist, an answering service, or nobody. We left out numbers listed as mobile phones, did not call on a weekend, and do not name the shops. The study is small and covers one trade in one state, so treat the percentages as a guide to the pattern, not a forecast for your shop. Related After-hours answering service for contractors Websites and Google review requests for HVAC companies Websites and Google review requests for plumbing companies Sources Davos Systems placed 160 calls to the main lines of 94 Georgia HVAC shops rated 4.5 stars or higher with 100 or more Google reviews, between 2026-10-14 and 2026-10-19; 154 calls reached an outcome at 93 shops and 6 failed on our side davossystems.com , accessed 2026-10-26 . At 12:30 pm on a weekday (93 calls): 54% live person, 23% phone menu, 12% missed (voicemail, no answer, busy or silence), 6% AI receptionist, 5% answering service; 11 of 93 calls were missed davossystems.com , accessed 2026-10-26 . At 5:30 pm (22 calls): 23% live person, 45% phone menu, 14% missed, 9% AI receptionist, 9% answering service davossystems.com , accessed 2026-10-26 . At 7:30 pm (39 calls): 15% live person, 33% phone menu, 26% missed, 13% AI receptionist, 13% answering service; 10 of 39 shops reached an AI receptionist or answering service davossystems.com , accessed 2026-10-26 . Of the 39 shops called at both 12:30 pm and 7:30 pm, 3 missed the lunch call, 10 missed the evening call, 13 missed at least one, and none missed both davossystems.com , accessed 2026-10-26 .