Answering service: what it costs and what to look out for
An answering service picks up your phone when you can't, notes who called and why, and passes that on to you. With human operators, in the Netherlands that usually costs €25 to €50 a month plus €1.50 to €3.00 per answered call. With an AI receptionist, the calls come as a bundle in the monthly fee; at callnorah.com that starts at €49.00 a month.
"Answering service" and "telephone service" are, in practice, two words for the same thing. The first sounds a little more like operators taking messages, the second is more neutral — but the word says nothing about what actually happens. You have to ask each provider, and below is what to ask about.
What does a cheap answering service cost?
That depends entirely on how often you get called, which is why "from €X" is a misleading number here. With few calls, a low subscription plus a fee per call is the best deal. From around fifty calls a month that tips over, because a bundle keeps running and a fee per call doesn't.
At fifty calls a month, callnorah.com costs €89.00, whereas an answering service charging €30 a month plus €2 per call comes to €130. At ten calls, that comparison is exactly the other way round.
So work it out with your own number of calls, not with the entry price. The full table per call volume is on what a telephone answering service costs.
What to look for in a good answering service
These six make more difference than the monthly fee. They apply to every provider, us included — feel free to ask us too.
Do they ask follow-up questions or just take notes?
A message with only a name and a number just means a second phone call for you. The question is whether they find out what you need in order to call back.
Does the service know your business?
An operator serving fifty clients doesn't know your service area or your prices. Ask how knowledge about your business is recorded and who keeps it up to date.
What happens when two people call at once?
With a single operator, the second caller gets a queue or an engaged tone. Ask how many calls can be answered at the same time.
What time does the phone go off?
Many answering services work office hours. Yet it's in the evening that people call who had no time during the day. Ask about the hours, and what happens outside them.
Can you cancel monthly?
Annual contracts and minimum volumes are common in this sector. If you're trying it out, you want to be able to leave without any hassle.
What does a call that leads nowhere cost?
Salespeople, wrong numbers, someone who's made a mistake. If you pay per call, you pay for those too. Ask how they're counted.
Human operators or an AI receptionist?
The honest answer is that it depends on your calls. An operator is a person and copes better with a call that's out of the ordinary: an angry customer, a story that goes off in every direction, something that calls for empathy. You pay for that per call, because every call takes up someone's time.
An AI receptionist has no rota, answers three calls at once and charges per month instead of per call. She knows your business because you tell her about it, and she doesn't make up what she doesn't know. On the other hand, she isn't a person, and some callers notice that.
Further reading
- How to stay reachable as a freelancer — five options side by side; an answering service is one of them.
- Voicemail or telephone service — how it differs from the free option you already have.
- By trade — what comes in for your line of work, and what a missed call is worth.
And the quickest test: call +31202140808 and pretend to be a customer.