What goes in a call brief?
Everything a caller is likely to ask, and every rule you would give a new hire on day one. An AI receptionist can only answer from what it has been given. If it does not know your hours, it guesses or stalls. If nobody told it which jobs you don't take, it may book them anyway.
Keep it to one page so you finish it and keep it current. The table shows the eight parts, each with an example line from a different kind of business. Swap in your own. The examples are illustrations, not prices or rules anyone published.
| Part | What to write | Example line |
|---|---|---|
| Basics | Name, hours, holidays, address or service area | Open Monday to Friday 8 to 5, closed public holidays; we visit homes within 25 miles |
| Services | What you do, and what you don't | We do cuts, color and keratin treatments. We don't do extensions. |
| Prices | Fixed prices and typical ranges you agree to say aloud | Consultation is free. Most simple wills cost $400 to $700; the attorney confirms after the first meeting. |
| Urgent calls | What counts, who gets it, what if they don't answer | Active leaks go to Sam's cell. If Sam doesn't answer, text Sam and tell the caller to expect a call within 15 minutes. |
| Booking | What can be booked, how long it takes, how far ahead | Estimates take 30 minutes and can be booked up to two weeks out. |
| Never say | Promises it must not make | Never promise a same-day visit or a price that isn't on this page. No legal, medical or tax advice. |
| Collect | What to take from every caller | Name, callback number read back, address, what's wrong, how they heard of us |
| Opening | Greeting, and any recording or AI notice you need | Thanks for calling Riverside Auto Repair. This call is recorded, and you may be talking to an AI assistant. |
What should it say about prices?
Only what you have written down. In the best-known chatbot case, a tribunal held Air Canada responsible for wrong refund advice its website bot gave a customer, and refused to treat the bot as responsible for itself3. A phone AI is no different: if it quotes a price, the caller will expect it.
So give it two kinds of price. Fixed prices you charge every time, such as a service call fee or a standard haircut. And typical ranges for work that varies, with a line saying who confirms the final price. Tell it what to say for everything else: that you will call back with a quote. Never let it make up a number.
Which calls should reach a person?
Three kinds. First, the urgent jobs you define, such as a burst pipe, a client in custody or a same-day cancellation you want to fill. Second, callers who are upset: in a set of studies, angry customers rated a company lower when a human-like bot handled them, while calm customers did not4. Third, callers the AI cannot understand. In a field study at a telecom company, speech-recognition failures led to more requests for a person and more complaints2.
For each, write who gets the call, which number to ring, and what happens if nobody picks up: a text to you, a message for the caller saying when to expect a call back, or a second person to try. A transfer that rings out into voicemail is the worst of both worlds.
What should it collect from every caller?
Decide what a good message looks like before the first call. Most businesses need a name, a callback number, the reason for the call and, for jobs on site, an address. Add one or two questions you always ask, such as how urgent it is or how they found you.
Ask for the callback number to be read back. In one benchmark of voice agents, spelling, read-back and confirmation made capturing names, addresses and dates more reliable, but added 21 to 28 seconds per call1. That trade is worth it for a phone number you need, and not for every detail.
How do you test the brief before going live?
Call it ten times before customers do, from a phone it has not heard. Ask the questions your customers ask most, ask for a price you have not written down, pretend to be an upset customer, and give a hard-to-spell name. Check each summary against what you said.
Then listen to the first week of real calls. Note every place where a caller asked for a person, got a wrong answer or hung up early, and add a line to the brief for each one. Most briefs need two or three rounds before they settle.