Set up your AI phone receptionist

Last reviewed October 21, 2026

Have an AI voice answer your practice line, answer common questions, take messages and point callers to booking.

An AI receptionist picks up when you can't, answers questions about your practice, takes a message and tells callers how to book. Before this, an unanswered call rang your browser and went to voicemail. When you're done, every call is answered.

Before you start

Time: about 90 minutes, including testing.
You'll need:
- A Flourivate number. See Get a phone number for your practice.
- Your knowledge content (services, prices, FAQs). If you already set up a website chat assistant, reuse the same content.
- AI credits. Calls use AI and call minutes. See AI credits and billing.

Step 1: Create the receptionist

Go to AI Supercenter > Phone AI and click New Voice Agent, then choose Voice Receptionist.
For knowledge, turn off business profile and choose to upload documents later.
For tools, choose Book appointments, Capture contacts, Send SMS, Transfer to human and Search knowledge base.
Enter a name and description, set the tone to Friendly, and paste instructions written for the phone (see the tip).

Instructions that work on the phone

Keep each reply to one or two sentences and ask one question at a time.
Ask why they're calling before asking for their name.
Say web addresses out loud ("maple coaching dot com slash book") and read names and numbers back.
Say it's a virtual assistant.
After each answer, ask "Is there anything else I can help with?" and don't hang up until the caller is done.
Spell your business name the way it sounds if it's unusual.
Add: "Never greet or introduce yourself again." The phone system speaks the welcome for you.

Step 2: Model, welcome and voice

Open the receptionist with Edit agent and go to AI Model & Instructions.
Choose an OpenAI model. Claude and Gemini models can't stream on phone calls, so they sound slow and choppy. (On Voice & Speech, they show "PSTN Streaming: Unsupported".) If a model shows "Something didn't work" when you save, pick another OpenAI model.
Write the Welcome Message (it's required), for example "Thanks for calling Maple Coaching. This is Jordan's virtual assistant. How can I help?"
Set Pause Before Speaking to 0 seconds so callers aren't left in silence.
Turn on Dynamic response and Stay silent on hold phrases, then click Save voice behavior. This applies to all your voice assistants.
Go to Voice & Speech and pick a built-in voice. Marin (warm) and Cedar (male) sound most natural. See Choose your assistant's voice.

Step 3: Call handling

Go to Call Handling.
Set Booking calendar to No calendar (disable booking). On calls, the assistant can't complete a booking yet. With a calendar linked it offers times and then says each one was "just taken". Have it point callers to your booking page instead, or take a message with times that suit them.
Leave contact capture on. The default questions (name, phone, email, reason for calling) work well.
If you want Transfer the call on, first set a destination in Phone System > Settings > Voice AI transfer. Without a destination, the transfer has nowhere to go.
Click Save.

Step 4: Teach it

Go to AI Supercenter > Knowledge, select the receptionist, and paste your content under Content. Knowledge is per assistant, so the phone assistant needs its own copy. See Teach and test your AI assistant.

Step 5: Send calls to it

On AI Supercenter > Phone AI, assign the receptionist to your number under Assigned AI agent. This alone doesn't change who answers.
Go to Phone System > Numbers, click Edit on your number, set First answer to AI answers first, choose the receptionist under Assigned AI agent, and click Save.
The routing preview should say "AI deployment active for this number."

Check it worked

Call your number from your mobile. Try: the greeting, a pricing question, "can I talk to a person?", "I want to book", and leaving a message.
In Phone System > Activity, the call appears. A new contact appears in Contacts for a new caller.
On the receptionist's Test & Activity tab, check Actions for the call. 0 means no text was sent.

If something's off

Callers hear a generic "Hi, how can I help you today?" instead of your welcome: add a pre-call greeting. Go to Phone System > Settings > Pre-call Greetings > New Pre-call Greeting, type Welcome, and enter something like "Thanks for calling Maple Coaching, the office of Jordan Lee. Connecting you to the virtual assistant." The routing preview then shows "Pre-call greeting plays" before the AI answers.
A long pause before it speaks: set Pause Before Speaking to 0 seconds in AI Model & Instructions > Welcome Message and save.
It says "I've texted you the link" but nothing arrives: texting from calls isn't reliable right now. Tell the assistant in its instructions to read web addresses aloud instead of texting them, and check Actions after test calls.
The assistant interrupts itself: this is being looked into. Keep replies short in the instructions.
No transcripts: call recording and transcription are off. See Record and transcribe calls.
The AI never answers: First answer is still Humans / browser first. Edit the number in Phone System > Numbers.
Don't script what to do when the caller is quiet. The assistant can't act on silence.