What can an AI receptionist do? Answer, book, text, transfer, and where it stops

What can an AI receptionist do? The jobs it takes on a call

An AI receptionist answers your business line in your business name and replies from the information you load. It asks your intake questions, books on a connected calendar, texts the caller and transfers urgent calls to a person. It answers only from what you give it.

My AI Front Desk's help center lists six jobs: answer from your knowledge, transfer by rules, text callers, collect information, schedule through a calendar, and log every call, text and voicemail. Business-in-a-Box, its one self-serve plan, bundles voice, chat, SMS, CRM and automations.

Business-in-a-Box costs $99 a month, billed monthly, as read on October 23, 2026. On it, My AI Front Desk answers in your business name, asks your intake questions, books on Google Calendar and texts the caller. Best AI receptionist sets it beside the other services.

Answering, intake questions and messages

The receptionist answers with a greeting you write. It speaks from a knowledge base, the business information you give it as text, website addresses or uploaded documents. When a caller asks something outside that knowledge, it follows the fallback you chose: take a message, send a text or transfer to a person. The vendor warns that a stale price list means stale prices quoted.

An intake form is a set of questions you want asked on a call. The receptionist asks them at the start and saves the answers as tickets in your dashboard. Callers can leave a voicemail when you turn that on, and blocked numbers are not answered.

Booking appointments and texting callers

Booking needs a service you offer, your hours for each day and a connected calendar. The receptionist then checks availability, picks an open slot and books it. The help center documents Google Calendar sync, GoHighLevel and Housecall Pro; marketing pages also name Outlook and Calendly, so confirm your calendar is supported before you buy.

The receptionist can text links or confirmations during the call, and you can set it to ask permission first. A follow-up text can go to a caller who hangs up early; a landline caller gets none. The plan includes 400 texts a month, then 4 credits (4 cents) each.

Transfers to a person, and calls it should not handle

A transfer rule pairs a situation you describe, such as a caller asking for the manager, with the number to call. A Cold Transfer passes the call on with the caller's number. A Hot Transfer adds a whisper handoff, a message played to whoever answers so they have context, plus backup numbers, so use Hot Transfer for urgent callers. My AI Front Desk review covers its transfers.

My AI Front Desk's own page says an AI should not decide a refund, give legal or medical advice or negotiate a rent concession. Callers who ask for a human need a transfer or a promised callback. For a person on complex calls, Smith.ai's hybrid mode brings in a live agent when the moment needs more care, from about $2.50 a call.

The pricing page labels the plan button "Start 7-day free trial". Terms section 12 say the subscription starts automatically if you continue, charging the payment method you provided, and usage fees still apply during the trial. Texts and transfers do not work in browser test calls, so use Receive Call, where the receptionist rings your phone. How to set up an AI receptionist lists the test steps.

CRM, Zapier and other apps

My AI Front Desk's marketing pages name HubSpot, Salesforce and Pipedrive integrations, while its help center says only HubSpot is available today and the rest are coming soon, so ask which CRM connection works now. My AI Front Desk connects to other apps through Zapier, and its pages give three different counts, so we say thousands of apps. Zapier comes with Business-in-a-Box; API access sits with the custom-priced Partner / Enterprise tier.