Close for the night. Your phone doesn't have to.
People call when they have time, and that's often after you've gone home. AlloPlace answers your line in the evening, overnight, on weekends and on holidays. It books what can be booked, takes a proper message for the rest, and gets you on the phone only when it's urgent.
Who's calling after hours
- People who work the same hours you do and can only call at night.
- People with a problem that just started: no heat, a leak, a lockout.
- People planning ahead on a Sunday afternoon.
- Customers checking on something they forgot to ask.
Voicemail works for the last group. The others mostly hang up and try someone else.
What it does
Answers in your name. Same greeting, same information, at 7 p.m. or 3 a.m.
Books for the morning. Routine requests get booked into open times in your Google Calendar, so your day starts with a schedule instead of a stack of voicemails.
Sorts the urgent from the rest. You write the rules in plain words. "No heat in winter: transfer to the on-call phone." "Everything else: take a message." It follows them.
Leaves you a clean list. Each call has a summary, so you can read last night's calls over coffee in a couple of minutes.
Compared with a traditional answering service
A human answering service is good at judgment calls and unusual situations. It also costs more, usually doesn't book into your calendar, and often can't take the call in French.
AlloPlace starts at US$30 a month, books directly into Google Calendar, speaks English and French on every plan, and you can read the full transcript of every call. Some businesses use both: AlloPlace for most calls, and a person for the tricky ones.
Good to know
- AlloPlace isn't an emergency service. Tell callers to call 911 for anything dangerous, and put it in your after-hours greeting if your trade gets those calls.
- Holidays: update your hours ahead of time so it doesn't offer a slot on Christmas morning.