AI receptionist for glaziers. Boarded today. Glazed a week Tuesday.
A window going through is two jobs, not one, and the second is where the money is. Carrie answers the Saturday call, gets it made safe, and takes the size, the type and whether it is double glazed while they are stood in front of it.
Nobody can price glass they have not measured. She gets the measurement out of them on the first call instead of on your second visit.
How does an AI receptionist work for a glazier?
An AI receptionist answers the call that cannot wait, gets what the glass actually is while somebody is looking at it, and books both visits rather than one. The same receptionist answers for every trade and local service we work with, and for this one the questions are about the glass.
The call goes through on a Saturday
A ball, a break-in or the wind. It is half four on a Saturday, they cannot leave the house like that, and they are ringing whoever comes up first.
Carrie gets what you cannot guess
Rough size. Upstairs or down. Single or double glazed. Is it a UPVC frame or timber. Toughened or laminated if they know. Has it gone completely or is it cracked. Is anybody hurt.
Both jobs go in the diary
The board-up today, and a date to come back and measure properly. The second one is where the glass money is and it is the one that quietly disappears when nobody books it at the time.
Saturday afternoon
You are boarding up a shop front in Sudbury at four on a Saturday. Your phone goes five times in the hour and you answer none of them, because you have a sheet of ply and a drill in your hands. By the time you get in the van at six, three of the five have already had somebody else, and you never find out what the other two were.
Answered, that hour is different. All five were dealt with while you were working. Two were board-ups within four miles, both with the sizes taken and one of them a double glazed unit upstairs, which tells you what goes in the van.
One was a cracked pane that can wait until Monday and is booked for Monday. One was insurance work with a claim number already written down. One was a wrong number.
And all three of the real ones have a measure-up booked for the following week, which is the half you normally have to chase.
What glaziers ask about it
Mostly about whether a customer can be trusted to describe glass, and about the second visit, which is the part of the job that goes missing.
Can a customer really tell it what the glass is?
Better than you would think, if somebody asks properly and they are stood in front of it. Roughly how big, upstairs or down, one pane or two, UPVC or wood, and whether there is a marking in the corner of the glass.
It is enough to know what to put in the van, which is the difference between one trip and two. The measurement to order off comes when you get there.
What can she say about price at half four on a Saturday?
Your board-up charge, if you have a fixed one, because that is what they are actually asking at half four on a Saturday afternoon.
The glass gets priced off the measurement and the type, which is why she books the measure at the same time.
Does it book the second visit as well?
Yes, and that is the argument for this trade. The board-up is the urgent bit and it is the bit that gets remembered. The measure and fit is the bit worth having, and it is the one that evaporates when somebody says they will ring you next week.
What about insurance jobs?
She takes that it is insurance, who the insurer is and whether there is a claim or reference number, so you know before you go. Whether you take that work and how you invoice it is yours and she does not agree anything on your behalf.
Somebody rings after a break-in. Is this right for a glazier?
Somebody who has just been broken into wants to know that a person is coming and roughly when. Getting that answered on the spot beats a ringtone by a mile.
Where anybody is hurt, or the police are involved, she stops and gets you. She also asks whether anybody has been cut, first, before anything about the window.
Will she tell somebody what to do about the glass?
She tells them to keep away from it, and to keep children and animals out of the room. That is keeping people safe rather than giving advice.
Anything involving hands on glass waits for you, which is what they are ringing a glazier for.
Does it answer at night?
Yes, and for this trade the small hours are real work. A window that has gone through at one in the morning is a house nobody can lock up, and the person who answers is the person who goes.
Half my work is commercial shop fronts. Does it treat those differently?
Yes. It asks whether it is a shop or a house, whether it is a shopfront pane, whether the premises are secure now, and who is authorising the work, because on a commercial job the person ringing is often not the person who pays.
What about misted units? Those are half my enquiries and none of them are urgent.
They are the opposite job and she treats them as such: no urgency, take the sizes, count how many, and book a measure at a sensible time. Somebody with four misted units is a good day's work and there is no reason to drop everything for it.
Does my number change?
No.
How is it set up?
Twenty minutes: what you charge to board up, how far you go out of hours, whether you do commercial, what you want asked about the glass, and what always comes straight to you. Then you listen to the first call.
Does an assistant know we come out tonight?
A broken shop front at nine on a Saturday night is now a question somebody puts to an assistant. It answers with a name, and Google writes the same sort of answer above the blue links for people who have never opened one.
- The two speeds are the fact worth publishing. Boarded tonight, glazed when the unit arrives, is what somebody stood in the dark needs to hear.
- Out of hours is a stated fact rather than a mood. The hours you genuinely turn out, and what that costs, belong on the page as text.
- Being named at nine at night is worth nothing if the phone rings out. She answers, takes the sizes, and you go out to a job you already understand.
Where else does she answer?
The phone is one of seven, and for this trade a photograph of the window is worth more than any description of it.
The AI receptionist
All seven channels, and what she covers on each one. See the AI receptionist
WhatsApp answering
Where the picture of the broken pane arrives. See details
Phone answering
The channel this page is mostly about, on its own. See details
What else is worth reading?
Every page here answers one question properly rather than skimming five. These are the others, and each one says what it is before you click it.
AI receptionist for landscapers
March to May the phone never stops and you are on a mower with ear defenders on. Every call answered, and the quiet months filled in advance.
AI receptionist for physios and instructors
You are with somebody for an hour and that is exactly when the phone goes. She answers, takes the booking, and never interrupts the session.
Foothold AI: websites and AI for local service businesses
A website that gets found, a back office that runs the day, and an app for your team. From £295 to set up and £99 a month. Suffolk based, UK wide.
Where we work: Suffolk and north Essex
Twenty towns across Suffolk and north Essex, from Sudbury. Most are twenty or thirty minutes away, and the person who builds your site comes out.
How many board-ups never came back for glass?
That is the job that pays, and it is the one nobody books while they are stood there holding a sheet of ply.
Twenty minutes with Chad. Nothing to pay and nothing to sign. The whole receptionist, and all seven channels, are on the AI receptionist page.