A person answers your phone 40 hours a week — minus lunch, breaks, sick days, and two weeks in July. This answers all 168, books the job while you do the important stuff, and costs less than a quarter as much. Here's the honest math, and then the actual prices.
This isn't compared against another app. It's compared against what it actually costs to hire somebody in Santa Clarita to sit at a desk and answer your phone.
Because that's the part that actually decides whether a caller reaches you or your competitor.
Every company selling this says it sounds human. I'd rather you decide for yourself, right now, before you look at a single price.
Not a demo line. Not a recording. That's my real business number, running the same setup I'd put on your phone. If I wouldn't put it on my own line, I've got no business selling it to you. Call it and judge the quality yourself — nothing to fill out, nobody following up unless you ask.
Ask about work I don't take on. Ask something with no clean answer. See whether it makes something up or admits it doesn't know and offers to have me call you.
Cut it off mid-sentence. Change your mind halfway through a booking. Trail off. Be a real person having a real phone call, not a polite tester.
Try to book a time that's already full and watch whether it works around you or falls apart. This is where most AI phone systems come undone.
11pm on a Sunday. That's the point. The forty-hours-a-week version of this is asleep, and mine is still booking work. Call at 2am on a holiday if you really want to make it interesting.
It tells you up front the call is recorded and AI-assisted — California requires that, and I'd tell you anyway. Then listen to what happens next. That's the part worth hearing.
Two ways to get the same receptionist: buy it once and own it, or have me run the whole thing for a monthly rate. Most people pick managed — but the keys are for sale.
I build the entire receptionist in your own accounts from day one, test it on a live line, train you to drive it, and hand you the keys. One-time price. No monthly fee to me — you pay the AI and phone bills directly. And when it breaks or needs changes, that's you — or buy my hours.
Everything The Front Desk does — answers 24/7, qualifies, books onto your calendar — built in your accounts and handed over.
Everything The Whole Job does — texting, reminders, review requests — including the carrier registration, built in your accounts and handed over.
Most of the businesses I set up need both — the receptionist answers the phone, the site books the people who'd rather not call. Custom websites start at $1,000 — one page from $1,000, full builds typically $3,000–$5,000, fixed quote on a call. Same person, same calendar, nothing to integrate.
You pay half the setup fee, and then I get to work — and you can still get me on the phone any time you want. Same build, same person, same result as if we'd met in your shop.
That's the only thing you pay to start — the other half waits until you've approved the finished build. You won't be billed for a month of service until you've had a month of service. Then a short intake form: your services, hours, FAQs, and where the hot calls should go.
Buying online doesn't skip the conversation — it just skips the sales pitch. Book a call before I build, during, or after. If you'd rather walk me through your business face to face first, do that. This thing is going to represent your name, and you should have a say in how it sounds.
I write the script, tune the voice, wire it to your calendar, and test it against real calls. You get a recording to approve before anything touches your live line — and the second half of your setup fee is due at that approval, before go-live.
Go live on the 5th and the 5th of next month is both your first bill and your guarantee cutoff — so you've had a full month of it working before you pay a monthly bill. Setup and tuning happen on my time, not yours.
Setup, testing, and tuning happen first — on my time, not yours. Only once everything is live and working the way it should does your first month begin.
It runs from the day it goes live to that same date the next month. If it isn't earning its keep by then, the second half of your setup fee comes back and your first monthly bill never goes out. The first half stays — it paid for a build that's already done. That holds whether you're month-to-month or on a term.
The guarantee comes first. Cancel in your first month and nothing reverts, nothing else gets invoiced, and the half you paid at signup is the whole of your cost.
No. Your number stays exactly where it is. We forward it to the AI — either only when you don't pick up, or all the time if you'd rather it answer everything. Either way it's reversible in about five minutes.
$24 an hour at 40 hours a week — the high end of average for a receptionist in Santa Clarita — is $4,160 a month in wages. Add employer payroll taxes and workers' comp and you're at roughly $4,550. That's before health coverage, paid time off, or the weeks it takes to hire and train somebody. I'd rather show you a number you can check than one that flatters me.
It sounds like a real person, and most callers just book and hang up. California law requires a disclosure that the call is recorded or AI-assisted, so that goes in the greeting. It's one short sentence, and it has never cost anyone a booking.
Because sending business texts legally means registering your number with the mobile carriers, and that filing can take weeks. I do the whole thing for you. Everything else on the plan goes live first while it clears.
Every plan includes a pool of answered minutes — 1,000 on The Front Desk, 1,500 on The Whole Job. That's more than a typical shop uses, and most months you'll never think about it. If you go past it, additional answered minutes are $0.50 each, invoiced after the fact. And I'll call you before you get near your limit, not after. Nothing gets sprung on you.
Month-to-month: Cancel any time. No term, nothing to revert.
On a 12-month term: Cancel any time. Leave before your term is up and your pricing reverts to month-to-month for the months you used — the monthly rate and the discounted setup fee — and I invoice the difference. Cancel inside your first month and the First-Month Guarantee applies instead: nothing reverts, and the second half of your setup fee comes back.
You are never on the hook for the rest of the term. There's no early termination penalty beyond giving back the discount you already received. Either way, just let me know — no hoops, no retention department.
No. Every plan is billed monthly, including the 12-month. Committing to a term just locks in a lower monthly rate — you're agreeing to stay for that many months, not writing one big check.
Yes, and a lot of people do. You pay the difference from that point forward, and I start the phone number registration the day you upgrade. The same goes for your billing term — start month-to-month, watch it work for a few weeks, and once you know you're keeping it, move onto a 12-month term and drop your monthly price. The lower rate starts the month you switch and holds as long as you finish the term.
Yes — that's Plan 01, Build & Handoff. Every receptionist I build lives in your own accounts from day one, so ownership is real: $2,499 one-time for a Front Desk build or $3,499 for a Whole Job build, and after handoff you pay the AI and phone bills directly. Updates, monitoring, and fixes are yours to handle — or you buy my time in four-hour blocks ($600).
Already on a managed plan? Convert to ownership any time for a $1,000 conversion fee plus any setup-fee difference. The math is built so every road to owning it costs the same — there's no clever order of operations that gets you there cheaper.
One thing to know: on a managed plan the configuration stays mine while I run it. Ownership comes through Build & Handoff — at signup, or by converting later.
Me. RunSmooth is one person — no call center, no support queue, no handoffs. That's the whole point of hiring me instead of a platform.
30 minutes, no pitch. Tell me how calls come in today and where your day gets stuck. I'll tell you which plan fits — or that neither one does.
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