What to ask before you sign with an answering service: a checklist

Answering services all promise the same thing: never miss a call again. The differences show up later, in the bill, in what happens to an urgent caller at 2 AM and in how hard it is to leave. Use this checklist on every service you're considering, whether it uses people, AI or both. Ask the questions on a sales call, check the answers against their website, and write them down so you can compare side by side.

Price: what will I actually pay?

1. How do you charge: per minute, per call, per caller or a flat monthly price? What's included each month?
2. What does it cost when I go over? Is there a different price per extra minute or call on each plan?
3. Are there setup fees, add-ons or charges for features like booking, transfers or website chat?

Each pricing model favors a different kind of business. Per-call pricing suits a few long calls; per-minute suits lots of short ones. Our guide to answering service costs explains the models and how to estimate your own monthly bill.

What happens on the call?

1. Can it book appointments into my calendar, or only take messages?
2. What does it say when it doesn't know an answer? Does it ever guess?
3. How does it learn my services, hours and prices, and how fast can I change them?

A message-only service means you still have to call everyone back. If most of your calls end in a booking, ask to hear or test a booking call before you sign. Also ask how they handle questions that aren't in their notes. A good service takes a message instead of making something up.

Urgent calls and reaching you

1. How do you decide a call is urgent, and how do I hear about it?
2. Can you put an urgent caller straight through to me or my on-call person? On which plans?

This matters most in the trades. A burst pipe or a family with no heat can't wait for tomorrow's message. Our page on answering for plumbers shows what a good urgent call sounds like, from asking about the problem to flagging it right away.

Your phone number and your other tools

1. Can I keep my number and forward only some calls, like after hours or when I'm busy?
2. What does it connect to: my calendar, my website chat, the apps I already use?

Keeping your number is important: it's on your trucks, your cards and your Google listing. Ask whether you can forward only the calls you miss, so you can try the service without giving up your phone. And ask for a plain list of what connects today, not what's on the roadmap. Here's ours, as an example of what to look for: the integrations that work today.

Contracts, trials and leaving

1. Is there a free trial, and do I need a credit card for it?
2. Is it month to month? How much notice do I give to cancel, and can I take my call history with me?

A trial on your real calls is worth more than any demo. Forward only after-hours calls for a week or two, then read the summaries. You'll learn more from ten real calls than from a sales pitch.

Questions people forget to ask

• Do callers hear that they're speaking with a virtual assistant or an outside service?
• Are calls recorded, and can I turn recording off?
• Who can see my customers' details, and is my data ever sold or used to train AI?
• What do I get after each call: a recording, a transcript, a short summary?

Comparing the answers

Put each company in a column and each question in a row. Look for honest answers, especially about where they're not a good fit. When we compare Global AI with other services, we say plainly where the other company is the better choice. You can see those side-by-side comparisons, with prices taken from each company's own website.

If you're weighing a well-known live service, our honest Smith.ai alternative page is a good example of the trade-offs between people and AI.

Red flags to watch for

• Prices you can only get on a sales call, with no plan or rate written down anywhere.
• A long contract, or a cancellation notice period that's buried in the terms.
• Vague answers about what happens to urgent calls at night and on weekends.
• Features described as "available" that turn out to be coming later, or cost extra.
• No way to try it on your own calls before you commit.

None of these means a service is bad, but each one is worth a follow-up question. A company that's confident in what it offers will usually put its prices, limits and cancellation terms in writing, and let you test it before you pay. If you're still unsure after a trial, ask for two or three example call summaries from your trial period and read them as if you were the customer who called.

How Global AI answers this checklist

Global AI is an AI receptionist with a flat monthly price and minutes included. Extra minutes are $0.25 each. It books into Google Calendar, answers website chat, flags urgent calls and, on the Growth plan and up, can put them through to you. It always says it's a virtual assistant. You can see the full list on our features page.

There's no contract, and you can start with 30 free minutes and no credit card. Paid plans start at $99 a month.