Phone Assistant: the guide

• New Zealand trades and service businesses whose owner is on the tools when the phone rings
• Sole traders and small teams who miss calls after hours, on jobs or on another call
• Businesses that already use Live chat and want the phone to answer the same way

Calls go to voicemail while you're working, most callers don't leave a message, and they ring the next business on the list. Urgent jobs get missed and the rest pile up for the evening.

• Every call answered in your business's name, keeping your own number
• Urgent calls put through to the right person, or flagged to you at once
• A short written summary of every call, so you call back once with what you need
• The same answers as your Live chat, from the AI control centre
• Spam and hang-ups never count towards your minutes
• Calls it makes for you, like checking stock or booking a tee time, from the same number and the same minutes

Answers when you can't

Your mobile rings first. If you don't pick up, you're on another call or your phone is off, the call moves to your Front desk. You can also have it answer after hours, or every call.

Takes down the job

For each kind of work it asks the questions you set, like the problem, the address and the best time, and reads the details back to the caller.

Knows what's urgent

You list what counts as urgent, like a burst pipe or no hot water. A caller who says one of them is put through to your list in order, or flagged to you at once if nobody picks up.

Answers from what you've checked

It answers questions from the AI control centre, the same as Live chat. If the answer isn't there, it says someone will get back to them and never guesses a price.

Writes up every call

Each call becomes a short summary with the details it collected, the recording and transcript, and what happened during the call.

Shows what needs you

Calls to return, times to confirm, texts to approve and questions it couldn't answer are sorted at the top, most urgent first.

Learns your answers

Answer a question once from a call, or fix an answer it gave, and calls and Live chat use your words from then on.

Makes calls for you

Press Make a call on Today or in Phone, say what you need, and it plans the call. Once you approve, it rings from your Phone Assistant number and tells you what was agreed.

Rings back for you

On any call that needs a call back, press Ring them back for me and it plans that call with what they rang about already filled in.

Knows who's ringing back

When a shop or club it rang calls your number back, it answers knowing why, takes their answer and adds it to your call.

Looks things up on the call

Ask about another business and it checks Google Maps while you wait: whether they're open, their hours, address and phone number.

Takes your requests by phone

Ring it from your own mobile and say "ring Mitre 10 and check they've got 20 bags of cement". It plans the call and waits for your OK in the app.

1. 1

   A call comes in

   Your phone rings as normal. Calls you don't pick up move on to your Front desk number.

2. 2

   It answers

   It greets the caller in your business's name, says it's an AI assistant and the call is recorded, and asks how it can help.

3. 3

   It takes down the job

   It asks your questions for that kind of work and checks the details with the caller.

4. 4

   Urgent goes through

   For something on your urgent list it tries your people in order, telling each who is calling and why first.

5. 5

   You're told

   Within a minute you get an email and the call shows in Calls, with what they want and what to do next.

6. 6

   You call back once

   Press Call, and the call is marked done when you've reached them.

1. 1

   When it answers

   When you don't pick up, after hours only, or every call.

2. 2

   What callers hear

   Your opening and question either side of the sentence that says it's an AI assistant, and the voice. Fill in any common question it has no answer for.

3. 3

   Jobs and urgent calls

   The questions for each kind of work, what counts as urgent, who urgent calls go to, and how you hear about calls.

4. 4

   Forward your phone

   Pick your phone company and dial three short codes. We ring your mobile to prove calls arrive.

5. 5

   Try it

   Ring your Front desk number yourself to hear what callers hear.

6. 6

   Go live

   Turn it on. Until then calls keep ringing only you.

Every Buildloop assistant works off your AI control centre, which holds your company details, knowledge and settings, trains each assistant and passes what one learns to the others. The more it knows about your business the more accurate every assistant is, and each one you add makes the others stronger.

Your AI control centre keeps what it knows about your business in Content Sections you can open, check and add to, with what's missing shown. Each says whether it's for customers, staff or both. You start with About the business, Products and services, Pricing, Payments, Opening hours, Contact details, Locations and service areas, Booking and ordering, Delivery and collection, Returns, refunds and warranty, Terms and policies, Common questions, Staff knowledge, Other, and can add, rename or remove them; the AI suggests sections from what it reads. How we talk, Rules and Suppliers are kept beside them.

Your mobile

Needed. Forwarding the calls you don't pick up, with your phone company's own codes.

A New Zealand Phone Assistant number

Needed. The number your calls forward to, and the number people see when it rings them.

Google Maps

Optional. Looking up another business's hours and number during a call, and finding a number to ring.

Web search

Optional, coming. Answering wider questions during a call, like movie times.

Texts to callers

Optional, coming. A text confirming their message, sent in your business's name once you approve it.

Your calendar

Optional, coming. Holding a booking time for you to confirm.

• Every text to a caller waits for your OK until you let that kind of text go on its own
• Holding a booking time waits for you to confirm it with the caller
• Urgent calls are put through only to the people and hours you set
• Every call it makes for you waits for your approval of the plan, including ones you ask for by phone
• Looking things up runs on its own: it only reads, and changes nothing
• Only your own people, ringing from the mobile saved in their call settings, can ask it to ring someone

NZ$149 a month, including 300 minutes a month, then NZ$0.40 for each minute after that. Cancel any time. Plus a one-off set-up and configuration fee, agreed after a short call about your business. Every account also has the AI control centre, NZ$49 a month, once for all its assistants.

• It never takes card numbers over the phone
• It doesn't quote a price you haven't given it
• Calls in te reo Māori and other languages are answered in English for now, and the caller is told why
• It can't search the wider web during a call yet: it checks businesses on Google Maps only
• It books times, sends quotes and answers invoice questions only when you have the Booking, Quoting or Get Paid assistant; until then it tells the caller you haven't turned that on, takes their details, and shows you what they asked for
• It doesn't move your number: you keep your own mobile and forward to it

• Calls, recordings and summaries are stored in Sydney, Australia, and only people in your business can open them
• Recordings are deleted once the call is written up; the written transcript stays
• What a caller says goes to the AI model to understand and write up the call, and is never used to train it
• Callers are told at the start that it's an AI assistant and the call is recorded