Feature
After-hours answering that books jobs while you're closed
After-hours answering means your phone keeps working when you've gone home. Wirepilot AI takes evening, overnight and weekend calls, books appointments into tomorrow's schedule, and sends real emergencies to whoever's on call.
Your plan starts after 7 days unless you cancel. Cancel anytime from your dashboard.
Why after-hours calls are worth answering
People call when they have time or when something goes wrong, and neither waits for business hours. Office workers book appointments on their lunch break or after dinner. Furnaces quit at 2 a.m. Tenants get locked out on Sunday. A lot of those callers won't wait until morning to hear back; they'll keep dialling until someone picks up.
Voicemail after hours asks those callers to wait. An answering service takes a message. An AI receptionist does the thing they called for: it books the appointment, tells them whether you can come out tonight, or puts them through to your on-call tech.
How after-hours rules work
You decide how each type of call is handled outside business hours:
- Routine requests (bookings, quotes, general questions) are handled on the spot and summarised for you in the morning.
- Urgent calls are transferred to your on-call number, with a text explaining why. If nobody answers, the receptionist takes full details and sends an alert.
- Emergency-only rules: you can set clear criteria, such as "no heat and it's below freezing" or "active leak", so you're only woken up when it's truly urgent.
- Pricing and expectations: if you charge an after-hours rate, the receptionist can say so before booking, so there are no surprises.
Forward only after hours
You don't need to change how you answer during the day. Set your phone line to forward calls after a certain time, or use your carrier's scheduled forwarding, and your receptionist takes over when you close. How to forward your calls.
Morning handover
Every after-hours call arrives as a text and email summary, and all of them are in your dashboard with recordings and transcripts. Start the day knowing who called, what they needed and what's already booked, instead of working through a voicemail backlog.
For trades, read our guide to capturing emergency jobs at 2 a.m..
After-hours answering: common questions
Can it wake me up only for real emergencies?
Yes. You define what counts as urgent, and only those calls get transferred or trigger an alert. Everything else waits in your morning summary.
Can I use a different on-call number each week?
Yes. Update the transfer number in your dashboard, or ask us to set up a rotation.
Can it quote an after-hours fee?
Yes. If you charge more for evenings or weekends, the receptionist can tell callers before booking.
Do I need to forward calls during the day too?
No. You can forward only after hours and keep answering yourself during the day.
Talk to our AI receptionist
Try it: ask to book an appointment, ask a question about the business, or say it's urgent.
Your microphone is only used while you're talking to the demo. Privacy policy
Stop sending callers to voicemail.
We set up your receptionist for you, free. Try it for 7 days, or book 20 minutes and we'll show it to you using calls from your own business.
Your plan starts after 7 days unless you cancel. Cancel anytime from your dashboard.