AI receptionist for locksmiths. They use the one who picks up.
Nobody stood outside their own front door at midnight rings round for a better price. They ring down the list until a person answers, and that is the one they book. Carrie answers on the first ring, at any hour, and takes the address, the lock and whether they are inside or outside.
You find out about the job when the details land on your phone, not when you get back in the van and see three missed calls.
How does an AI receptionist work for a locksmith?
An AI receptionist answers the call you cannot take, gets the address and the lock out of them while they are still on the phone, and puts the job on your screen before they have hung up. The same receptionist answers for every trade and local service we work with, from locksmiths to salons and dental practices.
The call comes while you are already drilling
You have one hand on a cylinder and a torch in your teeth. Your phone goes and there is no version of that where you answer it. It rings out, and they move to the next name.
Carrie picks up and keeps them there
Somebody answers immediately and starts asking useful things. Where are you, are you inside or out, is it a Yale or a euro cylinder, is anybody in the house. They stop ringing round because somebody is dealing with it.
You get the postcode, not a missed call
Address, number, lock type and what they said, on your phone. You ring back when your hands are free and you already know what you are driving to and what to take.
Your Tuesday night
Twenty past eleven, and you are knelt on a doorstep in Sudbury with a snapped key in a euro cylinder. Your phone goes twice while you are picking it. You cannot answer either one and you know exactly what that means, because it is the same call you got last Tuesday and the one before.
You finish, you get back in the van, and there are two missed numbers and no voicemail, because nobody standing in the cold leaves a voicemail.
With her on the phone, that same night ends differently. Both calls were answered while you were working. One is a lockout on the Halstead road, upstairs flat, she is outside and her son is inside. The other wanted a quote for changing three locks after a break-in, and is happy to hear from you tomorrow.
You ring the first one from the van, you are there in eleven minutes, and the second is booked in for Thursday.
What locksmiths ask before they take it on
Mostly about the hours, about whether it can tell a real emergency from a quote, and about what happens when somebody is upset.
Does it actually answer at two in the morning?
Yes, and for a locksmith that is most of the point. There is no quiet hour on your phone: the calls that pay best are the ones that come while you are asleep.
She answers every one at the same speed, whether it is Tuesday lunchtime or three on a Sunday morning, and you decide which of them are worth getting out of bed for.
Can it tell a lockout from somebody wanting a price?
That is the first thing she establishes, because for you the two are completely different jobs. Somebody outside their house at night is a now problem. Somebody pricing up a set of new cylinders is a Thursday problem.
You set what counts as a now problem, and only those reach you out of hours. Everything else is written up and waiting when you look.
What does it ask them?
The things you would ask, in the order you would ask them. Where they are, whether they are inside or outside, what kind of lock and door it is, whether a child or an animal is shut in, and whether the door is damaged.
The questions are yours, not ours. If you always want to know whether it is a UPVC door before you set off, she always asks.
People are upset when they ring me. Is this the right answer for a locksmith?
Somebody who is upset wants to be dealt with, and the worst version of that call is the one nobody picks up. A calm voice that answers immediately and starts asking sensible questions is a long way better than a ringtone and then voicemail.
Where it is genuinely serious she does not try to handle it. Somebody shut out with a baby inside, or a door that has been forced, goes straight to you.
Could it send somebody to the wrong address?
She reads the address back to them and gets it confirmed before the call ends, so it is right before anybody sets off. It arrives on your phone as text you can tap to navigate to.
I already have call diversion to my mobile. What does this add?
Diversion moves the ringing. It does not answer it. When you are on a job the diverted call rings out exactly like the original one did, and the customer hears the same nothing.
What about the ones who ring, get an answer, and still do not book?
You get those written up too, with what they wanted and what they were quoted elsewhere if they said. That is real market research on your own callers, and today it gets thrown away because nobody writes it down.
Does it work if I am a one-man operation?
It is aimed squarely at one-man operations. A firm with somebody in an office already has this; you are the one losing jobs because you cannot be knelt on a doorstep and on the phone at the same time.
What happens to my existing number?
It keeps working exactly as it does now. Nothing about how customers reach you changes, and nothing needs printing again.
Can it take the job on WhatsApp as well? People send me photos of the door.
Yes. WhatsApp, text, your website, email, Facebook and Instagram all come through the same receptionist and all land in the same place. A photograph of the door and the lock saves you carrying half the van up three flights of stairs.
WhatsApp answering covers that one on its own.
What happens when she is not sure?
She treats it as an emergency and tells you, every time. On a doorstep at midnight that is the only safe way round.
The price stays yours, so nobody turns up expecting eighty pounds. Pricing a lockout at midnight against a lock change on a Wednesday is your judgement.
How long does it take to set up?
It is set up with you rather than handed over. We go through what you want asked, what counts as an emergency for you, and what she should say about the areas you cover, then it goes live and you hear the first one yourself.
What happens after an assistant gives somebody our number?
An assistant hands over one name and one number, not a page of choices, and somebody locked out dials it within seconds. There is no shortlist in this trade and nothing gets compared, which cuts both ways.
- Being named puts you first in a queue of one. A call that rings out sends them straight back to ask again, and the second answer is somebody else.
- Getting in without breaking the door is what they are really asking. Whether you can, and what it costs, belongs on the page in those words.
- The hours you genuinely turn out are a stated fact. Written down, they can be matched. Left to be guessed at, they get guessed at wrong.
What else does she answer?
The phone is one of seven. The same receptionist answers your website, your texts, WhatsApp, email, Facebook, Instagram and your Google listing, in the same voice, into the same place.
The AI receptionist
All seven channels, and what she covers on each one. See the AI receptionist
Phone answering
The channel this page is mostly about, on its own. See details
Text messages
Every text gets a proper reply, so nothing sits unread while you are on a job. 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 builders
The extension enquiry rings once and never again. She answers while the digger is running, takes the detail, and books the site visit.
AI receptionist for cleaning companies
Most enquiries are one question: can you do Tuesdays. She answers it, takes the address and the hours, and the job reaches your rota.
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 did you miss last night?
Look at your call log for the last week and count the ones with no voicemail after them. Every one of those was somebody who got in.
Twenty minutes with Chad. Nothing to pay and nothing to sign. The whole receptionist, and all seven channels, are on the AI receptionist page.