In the UK in 2026, an AI receptionist costs roughly £99 a month at the answering-only end, up to a few hundred a month for a service that also books jobs, chases quotes and reports on your marketing. The cheapest options are add-ons bundled with web hosting, from £39 a month (IONOS, checked 12 July 2026) or a free first month with unpublished pricing after it (Fasthosts). A traditional human answering service, by comparison, runs closer to £300 to £500 a month. What you pay for is not minutes, it is how much of the job the service actually does.
Prices in this category are all over the place, partly because "AI receptionist" covers everything from a basic call-answering bot to a service that runs your whole front desk. Here is the honest range.
The corridor
Why "cost per minute" is the wrong question
Some services price by the minute, which sounds cheap until a busy month arrives and the bill balloons exactly when you can least predict it. The better question is not "what does a minute cost" but "how many jobs does this win me back, and does it cost less than one of them." An AI receptionist that wins you one extra job a month has usually paid for itself, whatever the headline number.
What actually changes the price
Three things: whether it just answers or also books into your diary; whether it works out of hours and at weekends (when a lot of trade emergencies happen); and whether it does anything with the data afterwards, like telling you which advert made the phone ring. The more of your front desk it runs, the more it costs, and for most trades the booking and the out-of-hours cover are where the value is.
Frequently asked questions
For answering-only, yes, it is a reasonable market floor. For a service that also books jobs and chases quotes, expect to pay more, and judge it on jobs won, not the sticker price.
For a very low call volume, or as a basic safety net, they can be fine. For a trade that lives and dies on its phone, the lack of diary booking and triage usually shows.
Almost always, and it covers hours a part-time hire never would. We compare the two properly in AI receptionist vs hiring a part-time receptionist.
Our current pricing is on the pricing page rather than quoted here, so it is always the live figure. If you want to see what it does before you look at price, talk to Daisy first.
Hear Daisy answer a call.
The AI front desk that answers every call, qualifies the job and books it while you stay on the tools. Try to catch her out.
