Fancy an AI receptionist? BT Business will sell your company one

Communications and broadband provider BT Business has today announced the launch of their new AI Receptionist tool, which as the name suggests is a new service that is designed to help small and medium-sized UK businesses to manage customer calls around the clock.

According to BT, phone calls remain the number one preferred way to contact a business, but failing to answer them due to limited resources can have a big impact. The operator itself claims that 67% of businesses, on an average day, allegedly miss at least one call that they believe results in losing business. BT claims this could be worth a predicted £3.7bn in UK revenue being lost annually due to not being able to answer the phone.

The new tool is being launched alongside BT’s free AI Adoption Hub. The Hub is designed to provide practical guides, prompt packs, expert insights, and real-world examples of businesses using AI, “giving businesses the confidence to unlock the value of AI and work smarter and safer“.

Jon James, CEO, BT Business, said:

“AI has the potential to be a huge boost to small businesses and to drive the UK’s growth, but many businesses are struggling to know how to begin and how to adopt simply and securely. That’s why BT – the UK’s most trusted network for business – has created AI from BT: a portfolio of practical, secure AI solutions backed by BT’s expertise and support.

AI Receptionist is the first step in the journey, helping businesses capture every opportunity, reduce admin and deliver responsive, personalised service around the clock, while keeping their customer data protected.”

BT said their AI Receptionist, which is designed to works across any UK fixed or mobile network (businesses don’t need to change their existing number or phone system), will be available on flexible contracts and can be set up quickly through a self-service portal. Customer data will also remain private and not be used to train AI models.

However, consumer sentiment toward the use of AI agents tends to be quite mixed, with many viewing it as being more of a negative (i.e. a way of reducing the number of actual humans that are available to provide support). Suffice to say, making too much use of AI could also risk discouraging customers, so it’s important to be careful with such tools.

AI Receptionist provides a range of services to help organisations concentrate on growing their business:

➤ Always-on service: Answers calls 24/7 and handles routine enquiries

➤ Simpler appointment management: Schedules appointments, sends confirmations and integrates with Outlook and Google Calendar

➤ Better follow-up: Captures and transcribes conversations and generates insights from customer interactions

➤ A tailored customer experience: Learns from business information and offers customisable voice and accent options

It is designed for sectors where incoming calls are an important route to bookings or new work, including:

➤ Trades and field-based businesses: capturing enquiries and arranging appointments while people are on-site

➤ Estate agents: qualifying enquiries, routing callers and helping arrange viewings

➤ Healthcare and professional practices: handling routine appointment requests and directing callers to the appropriate team

➤ Legal and financial services: capturing initial information and connecting clients to the right specialist

➤ Retailers: answering product, availability and promotion questions while employees support customers in-store

➤ Pubs, restaurants and hospitality businesses: answering booking and opening-hours enquiries while staff serve customers