Run an AI receptionist per site — each with its own number, its own opening hours and its own answers — without hiring a receptionist for every location or funnelling everything through one overloaded central line.
Configure one properly, then duplicate it for the next site and change what differs. The tenth location takes minutes, not a hiring round.
And because every site reports separately, you can finally see which one is actually missing calls.
Both of the usual answers fail, in opposite directions.
Groups tend to pick one of two arrangements. Either every site answers its own phone — which means coverage depends on who happens to be free at that site, and varies wildly between your best location and your worst.
Or everything routes to one central number, where a small team answers for sites they have never visited and cannot tell a caller whether the car park is open.
The first gives local knowledge with unreliable coverage. The second gives reliable coverage with no local knowledge. Neither gives both, which is why head office usually hears about the phones only when a complaint arrives.
An agent per site gives you both: every call answered immediately, with answers specific to the site that was called.
Set one up properly, then repeat it.
Start with the location that loses the most calls.
The sensible rollout is one site — usually the busiest, or the one that is hardest to staff. Put the agent on its number, let it run for a few weeks, and read the transcripts.
That site becomes the template. Duplicating it for the next location is a matter of changing the hours, the address details and whatever is genuinely different, rather than starting again.
Locations that are mid-contract on their existing phone system do not have to be untangled first. An agent can answer as an extension behind the system a site already runs, so rollout is not gated on telecoms paperwork.
And because each site reports separately, the business case for the next location comes from the last one rather than from a projection.
Priced per account, starting free — compare that with a per-minute service at every branch.
Start on the free plan with one location — no credit card. The AI receptionist itself is free and answering inbound calls costs nothing; each extra local number is $2 a month.
Each site can keep its own line: a new local number is $2 a month and a toll-free number $5, or an existing number can be connected or ported. Running a larger group? Talk to us and we will quote the whole estate.
Per-minute services scale badly across a group. Five locations each taking 200 two-minute calls a month is 2,000 minutes — roughly $2,000–$4,000 a month at $1–$2 a minute. Opening a sixth site adds another 400 minutes to that bill.
Hiring a receptionist per site costs more again, and still leaves the phones unanswered at lunch, at closing time and whenever that person is off sick.
The five-site example is an illustration — plug in your own sites and call counts. Answering-service pricing is a typical market range, not an Amernet quote — per-minute plans commonly run $1–$2 a minute plus setup and scripting fees. Amernet pricing is current as published on our pricing page.
What operators ask before rolling it across a group.
You configure one agent per site, but you do not build each from scratch. Duplicate a site that works and change only what differs — the hours, the address, anything specific to that location.
The AI receptionist is free and answering inbound calls costs nothing; you can start with one site. Each new local number is $2 a month. For a larger group, book a call and we will quote the whole estate. See pricing.
Yes. Each number routes to its own agent, so a caller ringing one branch gets that branch’s answers. See numbers and SIP trunks.
Each agent has its own knowledge base — that location’s hours, parking, services and rules — rather than one shared document that is wrong for most sites. See knowledge base.
Yes, and this is usually the first surprise. Results are reported per agent rather than blended into a group average, so a site missing calls shows up on its own numbers. See analytics.
No. Start with one location. Sites still on their own phone system can have the agent answer as an extension behind it, so nothing has to be migrated before you begin. See SIP extensions.
The agent can transfer the call on, introducing the caller first, so the person picking up already knows what it is about rather than starting over.
Pick the location that loses the most calls.
Book a short session and we will set an agent up for a single location with its real hours and details, then you ring it and see whether it answers like that site would.
