How does Frontly capture jobs when I am on the tools?

When a customer calls, Frontly answers in your business name, captures the job scope, the caller's address and contact number, asks when they want the job done, and writes the booking into your Frontly dashboard. You see it when you come off the tools. Each booking includes the full call transcript, so you have all the context.

Can Frontly detect emergency trade calls and escalate them?

Yes. Frontly listens for emergency keywords like 'burst pipe', 'no power', 'gas leak', 'lockout', 'flooding', and 'no hot water in winter'. It captures all job details, creates an urgent booking in your Frontly dashboard, and routes immediately to the on-call tradie by phone or SMS, even at 2 AM.

What does the AI sound like?

Frontly uses a natural, conversational English voice. Most callers cannot tell they are talking to AI. Try a free test call and judge for yourself.

How do I see the jobs the AI booked?

Every booking lands in your Frontly dashboard. Log in any time and see the inbound calls, captured jobs, transcripts, and outbound campaign results. Optional email and SMS notifications send the same data straight to your phone or inbox.

Is an AI receptionist better than a virtual (human) receptionist for tradies?

It comes down to pricing model and coverage. Human virtual receptionists usually charge per call, so a busy week gets expensive fast, and they only work business hours. Frontly is a flat monthly rate with unlimited calls, answers 24/7 including nights, weekends, and public holidays, and also makes outbound calls like quote follow-ups that a per-call answering service won't. For most tradies the flat rate wins on both cost and coverage.

How much does AI phone answering for tradies cost in Australia?

Frontly is a flat monthly rate sized by a monthly call-minute allowance, and every rate we meter beyond it is published on the pricing page rather than discovered on an invoice. Plans come in three sizes that scale with your monthly call minutes, and the current rates are on our pricing page. Competing services like Johnni AI and TransferToAI start at $99 but bill you for every answered call. Frontly does not.

How is Frontly different from Johnni AI or TransferToAI?

Johnni and TransferToAI are priced around $99 a month but are feature-light: no visual workflow builder, no cross-call memory, no outbound campaigns. Frontly includes all of those on every plan and runs both inbound and outbound from the same dashboard. Sophiie AI charges $300 a month plus $400 to $800 setup. Frontly is flat rate with a month-to-month option; see our pricing page for setup terms.

Can Frontly handle outbound follow-up calls to old quotes?

Yes. Frontly includes an outbound campaign manager. Load your list of quoted-but-not-booked jobs as a CSV, and Frontly will call each one, capture the outcome, and schedule a callback if needed. Up to 200 outbound agents per customer. One of the fastest ways to find extra jobs in your existing pipeline.

Does an AI phone system actually work for a trades business?

The category is well established, with AI agents handling millions of trade calls. The platforms that work are built around booking and dispatch rather than message taking, because a message does not stop the caller ringing the next tradie. The measure is jobs booked, not calls answered.

Can AI tell a real emergency from a job that can wait?

Yes, against rules you set. That separation is where most of the reported value sits: the genuine emergency gets booked and dispatched while intent is high, and the non-urgent call is captured for the morning instead of dragging a technician out. You define which is which during setup.

Electrician working on site while the phone goes unanswered

Answering job calls right now

AI Front Desk for Tradies

You're on the tools. Who's on the phone?

Frontly answers every call and books the job while you work.

Get Started Try a Free Test Call

Live in about an hourFlat monthly rateNo lock-inAustralian-built

The short answer

What is Frontly for trades?

Frontly is the AI virtual receptionist and answering service for Australian trades and home service businesses. It answers every job call 24/7 while you are on the tools, triages emergencies, and calls old quotes back to win more work, capturing every job in your Frontly dashboard. Live in about an hour, flat monthly rate from $149, no lock-in.

THE PROBLEM

On the Tools Means Missing the Phone

76%

of callers won't leave a voicemail. They call the next tradie on Google.

1 in 3

emergency service calls (burst pipes, power out, lockouts) arrive after business hours

$250-$800

average value of a single booked job. Missing one call a day costs $91K+ a year.

$55K+/yr

cost of a full-time receptionist. Frontly handles the same call volume for a flat monthly rate.

HEAR IT FOR YOURSELF

Your AI Tradie Receptionist Is Ready to Talk

Call our AI agent right now. It will handle a plumbing job enquiry just like it would for your business. No signup required.

Test Call

Talk to the AI agent right now from your browser. Hear exactly how Frontly will sound for your business.

Hear a real AI agent handle a typical inbound callNo signup, no card, no waiting on a sales rep

HOW IT WORKS

Live in About an Hour. No Developer Required.

Connect Your Phone

Forward your mobile or office line or get a dedicated AI number. No hardware, no IT project. Takes 5 minutes.

We Design Your Workflow

Our team learns your trade, your service area, your hours, and your emergency rules. We script exactly what the AI asks and what gets booked versus escalated.

Go Live

Frontly answers every call, captures the job in your Frontly dashboard, and SMSes you when a hot job is confirmed. Your team logs into Frontly each morning to act on what came in overnight.

Connect Your Phone

Forward your mobile or office line or get a dedicated AI number. No hardware, no IT project. Takes 5 minutes.

We Design Your Workflow

Our team learns your trade, your service area, your hours, and your emergency rules. We script exactly what the AI asks and what gets booked versus escalated.

Go Live

Frontly answers every call, captures the job in your Frontly dashboard, and SMSes you when a hot job is confirmed. Your team logs into Frontly each morning to act on what came in overnight.

WHAT FRONTLY HANDLES

Every Job Call, Handled

Frontly answers while you're on the tools and calls leads back before they go cold. Flat monthly rate, unlimited calls, every job captured in your Frontly dashboard.

New job enquiries

Answers in your business name, captures the job, address, and how soon they need you, and books it straight into your Frontly dashboard.

Emergency call-outs

Triages urgent jobs like burst pipes, no power, and lockouts, and escalates them to your mobile by call or SMS, even at 2 AM.

Quote follow-ups (outbound)

Calls back leads who asked for a quote but never booked, so the jobs already in your pipeline don't go cold. No per-call fees.

Existing-customer and warranty calls

Handles rebookings, callback requests, and status questions without pulling you off the job.

After-hours and overflow

Answers nights, weekends, and public holidays, and picks up the calls you can't when you're already on a job.

Visual Workflow Builder

Script Your Job Intake Without Code

We Build It For You

Our team maps your trade, your service area, your hours, and your call-out rules, then scripts exactly what the AI asks before it books.

Emergency Rules You Decide

You set what counts as urgent. A burst pipe at 2 AM escalates to your mobile; a quote request waits until morning.

Qualify Before You Drive

The AI captures the job type, the address, and how soon they need you, so you know if it is worth the trip before you commit.

Change It Yourself

Adjust your service radius, after-hours rules, or the questions asked, any time, without waiting on us.

Intelligent Branching

Route by job type, suburb, or time of day, so an after-hours emergency never follows the same path as a Tuesday quote.

Cross-Call Memory

Your AI Remembers Every Customer

Repeat customers recognised the moment they call
Previous jobs at the property recalled automatically
No asking a returning customer for their address again
Full job history on the callers you have worked for before

Frontly Dashboard

Every Job Captured While You Are on the Tools

Every Job In One Place

Jobs land in your Frontly dashboard with the address, the problem, and the urgency already captured. Check it between jobs, not at 9 PM.

Full Transcript on Every Call

Exactly what the customer described, in their words, so you turn up with the right parts on the van.

Emergency Alerts to Your Mobile

Configure an SMS or a call the moment an urgent job is confirmed, so you hear about the burst pipe immediately.

Cross-call History at a Glance

See every previous call from that address, with what was quoted and what was done.

Live Status While You Work

See what has come in today without stopping what you are doing.

Outbound Campaign Manager

Turn Cold Quotes Into Booked Jobs

Chase the Quotes You Never Followed Up

Frontly calls back the leads who asked for a price and went quiet. The jobs are already in your pipeline; nobody has had time to ring them.

Seasonal Service Reminders

Call your past customers before the season turns, for gutter cleans, aircon services, and annual safety checks.

Same Builder, No New Tool

Script an outbound campaign with the same drag-and-drop builder you used for your inbound calls.

See What Landed

Track which callbacks turned into booked jobs, so you know which lists are worth calling again.

See all features

INTEGRATIONS

Works with the software trades & home services already runs on

Frontly connects to any system that exposes an OAuth2 or API-key integration. These are the ones we have verified for this industry.

ServiceM8

Connects via OAuth2 or API key

Visit ServiceM8

Simpro

Connects via OAuth2 or API key

Visit Simpro

Fergus

Connects via OAuth2

Visit Fergus

AroFlo

Connects via HMAC-signed key

Visit AroFlo

Not on the list? If your system offers an OAuth2 or API-key integration, we can connect it. Tell us what you run and we will confirm before you commit to anything.

WHAT USUALLY DECIDES IT

The three questions that come up every time

A real person, whenever the caller wants one

Every workflow can hand the call to you or whoever is on call. The transfer carries a spoken briefing, so your team picks up already knowing who is calling and why. The caller never has to explain themselves twice, which is usually the moment a good call turns into a complaint.

More than one language, on the same number

Frontly answers in more than one language on the same number. On a job site or in a suburb where English is a second language for many customers, that is jobs you would otherwise lose at hello.

Flat monthly rate, with the meter switched off

No per-minute billing, no per-call fee, and no cap on how many questions the AI is allowed to answer. Your busiest month does not produce your largest invoice, and adding another topic to its knowledge does not add a line to the bill. See pricing for the current rates.

ANSWERING SERVICE OR AI

Answering service or AI receptionist for a trade business?

An answering service takes a message while you are under a house. An AI receptionist books the job. For a trade business that is the whole argument: a message means you still have to ring back that evening, and by then the customer has called the next plumber on the list.

Where a staffed answering service still wins

A genuinely unusual call. Someone describing a fault badly, an insurance job with complications, a builder trying to coordinate three trades. A human operator can improvise around that in a way a configured workflow will not.

Where Frontly wins

Standard callouts, quotes and emergencies are not unusual, they are most of your phone. Those get triaged and captured on the call, including at 11pm, and the genuine emergencies ring you rather than sitting in an inbox until morning.

Most businesses end up running one or the other rather than both. If you are weighing it up properly, the full cost and capability breakdown is in Frontly against a human receptionist.

WHAT THE MARKET IS ALREADY DOING

The trades platforms that work are built around booked jobs, not messages

The trades market moved past answering services quickly, because a message is worth very little when the caller is ringing three other tradies in the same ten minutes.

Millionsof trade calls handled by AI agents across the categoryEnough volume that the workflow patterns are well understood: confirm the address and service area, identify urgency, book the slot.

Urgency firsttriage is the differentiator, not answeringThe value splits two ways: booking the genuine emergency while intent is high, and protecting the technician from a call-out that did not need one.

24/7after-hours demand converted into booked workRoughly a third of emergency service calls arrive outside business hours, which is exactly when no Australian trades business has someone on the phone.

256-bit Encryption

Australian-hosted

Privacy Act 1988 compliant

FAQ

Frequently Asked Questions

KEEP EXPLORING

Keep exploring Frontly for Trades & Home Services

Go deeper on the capabilities, comparisons, and guides that matter most.

24/7 inbound answering

How Frontly answers every call, qualifies the caller, and books the job in your dashboard.

How inbound works

Outbound campaigns

Recalls, follow-ups, arrears, and lead reactivation dialled automatically at scale.

Run outbound

After-hours answering

Emergency callouts do not respect business hours. See how a genuine 2am emergency reaches you and the rest does not.

See after-hours

Forward your business line to AI

A carrier-by-carrier guide to forwarding Telstra, Optus, and more to an AI receptionist.

Read the guide

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