The phone agent

The phone agent answers your business's calls: hours, address, what you sell, and, if you allow it, messages, handing the call to a person, and more.

Where it lives

Settings, the Texting & calls tab, the Phone agent card. Owners change it; managers can look. The card's status tells you where things stand: not added, a free taste (it doesn't answer real calls during the trial's taste), off, out of minutes, or on with your number.

Get a number

Calls reach the agent on a toll-free number. Set it up in Settings, Texting & calls, Your business number (first on that tab): the owner fills in the registration and submits it. The EIN comes from Filing info when it's saved there; one typed here is saved there for next time (it needs two-step sign-in turned on, see Security and two-step sign-in). Approval usually takes 3 to 10 days. Then forward your existing number to it with your phone carrier, or use it as your business line.

Who answers when the agent can't

Under Ring this phone when the agent can't answer, enter the phone that should ring. If there's no number, callers hear your hours and are asked to call back.

What it may do and know

Under What the agent may do and know, tick what it may do:

• Hand the call to a person and Take a message (on to start with)
• Your hours and address, and for cafés and shops What you sell (names only, never prices)
• Take pickup orders (cafés and shops, when switched on for your business)
• Pages from your website: up to 5 public https pages, read when you save, not during a call

Choose Save what it may do. Or ask the assistant: "let the phone agent take messages."

Handing a call to a person

With Hand the call to a person ticked and a phone to ring, the agent hands the call over when the caller asks for a person, is upset, has an emergency, or calls about a refund, a charge, an injury or a legal matter, or when it can't help after two tries. Callers can also press star to leave the agent, then 1 to be connected.

Messages and call notes

The agent takes the caller's name, a number to call back and what it's about. Calls that went badly (an upset caller, a failed hand-over, something the agent couldn't do) are listed in Conversations, with any message taken. RoleCall keeps no recordings or transcripts.

Voice and names

Pick a voice under Phone voice and play a sample. Under Name pronunciations, add one rule a line, like Acai = ah-sigh-EE, then Save pronunciations.

Minutes and cost

The phone agent is an add-on with about 300 minutes a month. The card shows the minutes left. After that, extra minutes are 20¢ each up to your monthly spending cap (if you allowed extra usage in Billing); otherwise calls ring your phone. Calls are counted in whole minutes and last at most 15 minutes.