AI receptionist
An AI receptionist is software that answers a business’s phone calls and holds a spoken conversation with the caller. It greets them, answers questions, takes details, books appointments and routes calls, with no person on the line.
Also called: AI phone receptionist, AI answering agent, virtual AI receptionist
An AI receptionist combines speech recognition, a language model and speech synthesis so that a caller can talk naturally rather than pressing keys. It works from a script or knowledge base the business supplies, and from any systems it is connected to, such as a calendar or a CRM.
It occupies the same seat as a human receptionist or an answering service: first point of contact on the phone. The difference is in staffing and scale. There is no rota, no hold queue caused by too few agents, and every call is answered in the same way at any hour.
What an AI receptionist can and cannot do depends on how it is configured. Most are set up to handle a defined set of tasks and to transfer or take a message for anything outside that set, which is why the handoff to a person is as much part of the category as the automation.