The best AI for missed calls and lead intake in 2027: which one fits your shop

A missed call is often a missed job. You’re on a roof or under a house, the office is at lunch, and the caller tries the next name on the list.

In 2026, AI answering got good enough to trust with that call. It picks up right away, talks like a person, and either books the work or sends you a clean summary. Choosing is the hard part now, because "AI receptionist" covers five different kinds of product:

• Built into your field service software: Jobber, Housecall Pro, ServiceTitan and Workiz each sell their own.
• Standalone AI receptionists: Rosie, Goodcall and others that work with any phone number.
• AI with people behind it: Smith.ai, where the AI can hand a call to a live agent.
• Phone systems with an AI add-on: Quo (formerly OpenPhone), which also texts back missed calls.
• Lead-response platforms for bigger shops: Avoca, Sameday AI and Hatch, which chase web and marketplace leads as well as answering the phone.

How we judged them

We looked at each one the way an owner would, across the five things that decide whether it works in a real shop:

• Ease of setup: how long until it’s answering, and what you have to do to your phone number.
• Cost: the published price and how it’s metered. Per minute, per call, per conversation and per customer all behave differently in a busy month.
• Integrations: whether it books into your schedule or only sends you a summary.
• AI: what it can do on the call: book, reschedule, qualify, transfer and text back, and in which languages.
• Stand-out feature: the one thing it does that the others don’t.

Prices are each company’s published rates, checked November 10 and 11, 2026. Where a company doesn’t publish a price, we say so. One note on where we stand: setting up AI intake is one of our services, so we have a point of view. Everything below comes from the vendors’ own pricing and help pages, linked at the end.

The scorecard

Already on field service software? Start there

If your jobs, customers and schedule already live in one of these four, its own AI is the first thing to try. It knows your services and your calendar, and a booked call lands on the schedule with nothing to connect.

Jobber Receptionist

Best for: small and mid-size service shops already on Jobber.

• Cost: $29 a month as an add-on, with 30 conversations included and 79 cents for each one after. It’s included with unlimited use on Jobber’s Plus plan. Spam and hang-ups don’t count, and a text thread counts once for up to 24 hours.
• Setup: six guided steps that end with a test call. You need a Jobber phone number, and you can forward your existing number to it.
• Integrations: Jobber only.
• AI: answers calls and texts around the clock, several at once. It books jobs using your online booking settings, creates requests, reschedules and cancels visits, and texts or transfers to you on keywords you choose.
• Stand-out: you pay per conversation, not per minute, so a long call costs the same as a short one.
• Watch for: on the add-on, if you set it to pause at 30 conversations it stops booking and only takes messages until the next billing cycle.

Housecall Pro CSR AI

Best for: shops already on Housecall Pro.

• Cost: Housecall Pro doesn’t list a CSR AI price on its feature page. Its own buyer’s guide says plans start at $59 a month with unlimited minutes. Get the full number, including your Housecall Pro plan, in writing.
• Setup: sign up inside the app, then forward your calls to the number it gives you. Housecall Pro says you’re live in minutes, and there’s a test button in settings.
• Integrations: Housecall Pro only.
• AI: answers calls and website chats 24/7 and books jobs onto your calendar from your schedule and services. If a caller asks for a person, it takes their details and sends the call to a number you choose.
• Stand-out: it can share the phones with HCP Assist, Housecall Pro’s live answering team: people during the day, AI after hours.
• Watch for: answering texts is still marked as alpha or coming soon on Housecall Pro’s own pages.

ServiceTitan AI Virtual Agent

Best for: multi-truck HVAC, plumbing and electrical shops on ServiceTitan.

• Cost: by quote. It’s sold as a Pro product on top of ServiceTitan.
• Setup: ServiceTitan says about 20 minutes. It can run alongside your current phones or inside Contact Center Pro.
• Integrations: ServiceTitan only, built in.
• AI: books onto the dispatch board by job type, location and technician skills. It confirms and reschedules appointments, recognizes members, calls or texts new leads, and transfers to a live CSR when a call falls outside your rules.
• Stand-out: capacity-aware booking. It only offers times your board can cover.
• Watch for: the booking-rate numbers on its page are ServiceTitan’s own, with no method given. Ask for a reference shop your size.

Workiz Genius Answering

Best for: shops already on Workiz. It needs a Genius Phone plan, and Workiz doesn’t publish the price. It answers calls, texts and emails in English and Spanish and books inside your online booking hours and service areas. Two limits to know: each agent takes one call at a time, and once you pass your plan’s monthly conversations, calls skip it.

Standalone AI receptionists

No field service software, or you’d rather keep answering separate? These work with any phone number. The trade-off is that they send you a summary or pass data through Zapier. They don’t see your schedule the way a built-in agent does.

Rosie

Best for: owner-operators and small crews who want low cost and no setup project.

• Cost: $49 a month for 250 minutes, $149 for 1,000 or $299 for 2,000, with a 7-day free trial.
• Setup: it trains itself from your Google Business Profile and website, then you add your own answers.
• Integrations: Zapier on every plan. No field service software is listed.
• AI: answers 24/7, takes several calls at once, speaks English and Spanish, filters spam, and sends a summary, transcript and recording. It can text callers a booking link.
• Stand-out: Spanish on every plan and a real price on the page, about 20 cents a minute at the entry level.
• Watch for: live call transfers and calendar booking start on the $149 plan, and the pricing page doesn’t show the overage rate.

Goodcall

Best for: shops with long calls or the same customers calling back. Goodcall bills by unique customers, not minutes: $79 a month for 100, $129 for 500 or $299 for 2,000. You can build and test an agent free and pay when you connect a number, which can be a new local one or your own, forwarded. Connections to other software run through Zapier or custom tools, and the entry plan allows one.

AI with a person behind it

Smith.ai

Best for: emergency work and high-value calls, where a wrong answer costs more than the service does.

• Cost: free for 25 calls a month, then $3 a call. Pro is $150 a month at about $2 a call, and Enterprise is $500 at about $1.67. No setup fee, month to month.
• Setup: about 15 minutes, by Smith.ai’s estimate.
• Integrations: HubSpot, Salesforce and Calendly directly, and most other software through Zapier or Make.
• AI: screens and qualifies leads, runs your intake questions, books appointments and warm-transfers the caller to your team with the context. English and Spanish.
• Stand-out: the AI can pass a call to Smith.ai’s live agents, and there’s no fee when the AI is the one that escalates.
• Watch for: per-call pricing adds up fast for a busy service shop, and extra live-agent work is a per-call add-on with no listed price.

If you want a person on every call, Ruby is the all-human option: $250 a month for 50 minutes of live answering, up to $1,725 for 500.

Missed-call text-back on a phone plan

Quo Sona

Best for: small shops that need a business phone system anyway and mostly want missed calls caught.

• Cost: an add-on to a paid Quo plan. About 10 Sona calls a month are included free, then it’s $25 for 40, $49 for 100 or $99 for 250. It bills per call, not per minute.
• Setup: you switch it on inside Quo, with a 7-day trial.
• Integrations: works only inside Quo.
• AI: answers 24/7, takes messages, answers basic questions, transfers to a teammate and texts the caller a scheduling link or form during the call. It also follows up by text when a call is missed or a new lead texts in. English, Spanish and French.
• Stand-out: text follow-up on missed calls is free on every plan while it’s in beta.
• Watch for: inbound only, it can’t switch languages mid-call, and it won’t book into job software.

Bigger shops and paid leads

Once you have a call center or you’re buying leads, the job changes from answering the phone to answering everything, fast.

• Avoca: an AI CSR that answers calls, texts and chats and books the job, plus a speed-to-lead product it says responds to new leads in under 15 seconds, outbound campaigns and call scoring. It’s a ServiceTitan certified app and also lists Housecall Pro and FieldRoutes. Price by quote.
• Sameday AI: trade-focused answering with a price on the page: $449 a month for 500 minutes or $789 for 1,000. It books into ServiceTitan and other CRMs.
• Hatch: AI CSRs across voice, text and email that work leads from Angi, Thumbtack, Google Local Services and Yelp. It connects to ServiceTitan, AccuLynx, LeadPerfection and improveit 360. Pricing is a platform fee plus usage on an annual plan, by quote. A fit for roofing, remodeling and replacement sales teams.

Builders and remodelers

A custom builder or remodeler gets fewer calls than a plumber, and each one is worth far more. The goal isn’t to book a two-hour window. It’s to find out what the project is, where it is, the budget range and the timeline, then get a person on the phone quickly.

Neither JobTread nor Buildertrend sells a phone receptionist. JobTread’s integrations page lists Zapier, HighLevel and its AI Connector, which links ChatGPT and Claude to your job data but doesn’t answer calls. Buildertrend’s AI tools, which we covered in our construction software guide, handle bills, client updates and paperwork. So you pair a standalone service with your job software:

• Smith.ai’s free plan covers 25 calls a month, which is plenty for many builders. Have it ask your qualifying questions and send the summary to your team, with Zapier passing the lead to JobTread.
• Rosie’s $149 plan adds live transfers, so a qualified caller reaches your salesperson while they’re still on the line.
• HighLevel has a native JobTread integration, with voice AI, web chat and missed-call text-back in one system. Its AI Employee plan is $97 a month per account for unlimited use, or you pay by usage, from about 10 cents a minute for voice plus phone charges. It takes the most setup of anything here and is often run by a marketing agency.

This is also the work we do in an AI integration: an intake that asks your questions and files the lead where your team already works.

What phone number can you use?

You almost never have to give up the number on your trucks. Most of these services hand you a new number and you forward your existing one to it. A few are phone systems, so you move your number in instead.

How forwarding works depends on the line you have today:

• Cell phone: ask your carrier for conditional call forwarding, which sends only the calls you miss or can’t take. Smith.ai requires it for cell numbers.
• Landline: forward every call, or only unanswered ones if your provider offers that.
• Google Voice and other internet phone systems: set forwarding in the app. Jobber and Smith.ai both publish Google Voice steps, and Jobber says to turn off call screening.
• Toll-free and Canadian numbers: Quo ports US, Canadian and North American toll-free numbers, including landlines and personal cell numbers.

Two rules apply to all of them. The AI can’t hand a call back to the same line it was forwarded from, or the call loops, so give it a second number, such as a personal cell, for transfers and emergencies. And keep advertising your own number. Housecall Pro and ServiceTitan both say their forwarding numbers should never be given to customers.

How to choose for 2027

• One truck or a small crew, no office software: Rosie at $49, or Quo with Sona if you also need a business phone.
• Already on Jobber, Housecall Pro, ServiceTitan or Workiz: the built-in agent first. Look elsewhere only if it can’t handle your calls.
• Emergency-heavy trades: Smith.ai for the live backup, or a built-in agent with a strict rule that sends emergencies to a person.
• Multi-truck shop with CSRs: ServiceTitan’s agent or Avoca, or Sameday AI if you want a listed price.
• Buying leads from Angi, Thumbtack or Google: Hatch or Avoca, where speed to the first reply is the product.
• Builder or remodeler: a standalone service set up to qualify, connected to your job software.

Whatever you pick, the rules are the same:

• Call it yourself first. Be the angry customer, the price shopper and the 2 a.m. burst pipe before your customers are.
• Send emergencies to a person. Every service here can transfer the call or alert you. Set that rule on day one.
• Start with after-hours and overflow. Let it prove itself on the calls you were missing anyway.
• Know the meter. Minutes, calls, conversations and unique customers add up differently in your busy season.
• Check where the lead lands. A summary in an inbox nobody reads is still a missed call.
• Check your state’s rules on recording calls before you turn on recordings and transcripts.

Questions

What’s the difference between an AI receptionist and missed-call text-back?

An AI receptionist answers the call and talks to the caller. Missed-call text-back lets the call go unanswered, then sends a text within seconds so the conversation continues by message. Text-back is cheaper and simpler. A receptionist catches the callers who won’t text, and it can book or qualify on the spot. They work well together.

How much does an AI receptionist cost a contractor?

Going by published prices this month, entry plans run from free to about $50 a month: Quo’s included Sona calls, Jobber’s $29 add-on and Rosie’s $49 plan. Mid-range plans run $79 to $150, such as Goodcall and Smith.ai Pro. Trade-specific services for multi-truck shops start around $449 with Sameday AI, and several of the biggest names only quote. All-human answering starts at $250 for 50 minutes with Ruby.

Will it book jobs straight into my schedule?

Only if it’s connected to your schedule. The agents built into Jobber, Housecall Pro, ServiceTitan and Workiz book directly, and Avoca and Sameday AI book into ServiceTitan. Standalone services take the details and send a summary, text the caller a booking link, or pass the lead along through Zapier.

Do I have to change my phone number?

Usually not. Most of these work by forwarding your existing cell, landline or internet number to the AI, so your trucks, cards and Google listing stay the same. Quo and Workiz are phone systems, so you move your number into them instead. The table above shows which is which.

Can it replace the person who answers our phones?

For routine calls after hours and during rushes, yes. For upset customers, emergencies and anything unusual, you still want a person, which is why these services hand off. Treat it as coverage for the calls you were missing, not as a replacement on day one.

Sources

• Jobber: Receptionist, powered by Jobber AI
• Housecall Pro: CSR AI
• Housecall Pro: CSR AI overview
• Housecall Pro: Best AI answering services for contractors
• ServiceTitan: AI Virtual Agent
• ServiceTitan: AI Voice Agent FAQ
• Workiz: Genius Answering FAQ
• Rosie: Plans and pricing
• Rosie: AI receptionist
• Goodcall: Pricing
• Smith.ai: AI Receptionist
• Smith.ai: Can I use my current business phone number?
• Ruby: Plans and pricing
• Quo: Sona
• Quo: Number porting
• Avoca
• Sameday AI: Answering service cost
• Hatch: Pricing
• JobTread: Integrations
• HighLevel: AI products pricing