Make Your First Test Call

Two minutes on the phone with your own receptionist tells you more than any settings screen. This is the single most useful thing you can do on your first day.

Reading settings is not hearing them#

Reading what your receptionist will say is not the same as hearing it. On the phone you’ll immediately notice the wrong word for a service, a price you’d never quote, or a slot far further out than you’d offer in person.

Every one of those is a customer who would have hung up. You get to fix them first.

How to do it#

1. 1

   Use a different phone

   Ring from your mobile if the business line is a landline, or ask someone in the office to call. Calling your own forwarded number from itself can behave oddly.

2. 2

   Pretend to be a real customer

   Don’t test it like software. Describe a job the way a stressed customer would — vaguely, mid-sentence, with the TV on.

3. 3

   Let it lead

   Answer its questions naturally. Notice whether the order it asks things in feels right for your trade.

4. 4

   Go all the way to a booking

   Take a slot. Then check your calendar and your alerts — the whole path, not just the conversation.

5. 5

   Cancel the test appointment

   Otherwise it sits in pipeline and eventually counts as a no-show against your hold rate.

What to listen for#

• The greeting. Is your business name said the way you’d say it?
• The words. Does it use your customers’ language, or your internal terms?
• The questions. Is it asking what you’d actually need to know before sending a van?
• The price. Would you stand behind the number it just quoted?
• The slot. Is the first time it offers one you’d be happy to promise?

Four things worth trying#

1. 1

   Ask something it can't know

   “Do you service pool heaters?” when you don’t. It should decline or promise a callback — never invent an answer.

2. 2

   Interrupt it mid-sentence

   It should stop and listen, the way a person would.

3. 3

   Ask for a human

   Check it does what you expect — transfers if you’ve set that up, or takes a message and flags it urgent if you haven’t.

4. 4

   Call outside your hours

   Ring in the evening. It should say you’re closed, still capture the lead, and offer your first genuinely open slot.

What happens next#

Your test call appears in Conversations like any other, with the recording and transcript. Play it back — you’ll hear things you missed while thinking about what to say.

Anything you want changed lives in Business Config. Fix it, then ring again and confirm.