Phone answering services

[callthatgirl]

Last month when I missed 5 phone calls on a Sunday, I decided to get an answering service to get those calls and email me messages. Well, the service works great. I startd the next Monday and it really was pretty cool. No more checking voicemails 5x a day, no more worrying and we have found less hang ups. I also liked that they captured the phone and name and problems.

Then I got the first month bill

300 minutes
180 calls

$315!!!

I guess in my happiness, it didn't dawn on that the emails I got with instant messages were adding up daily. I did notice our hang ups were very low and no tire kickers. We landed almost every client, so I am sure this paid off. But I don't want to pay this amount every month. Holy crap.

Does anyone else use a service and have a recommendation of one that is maybe a bit cheaper?

 

[bigdessert]

You can forward it to me in northern MN .....

seriously though....I have no experience with a phone answering service.

 

[callthatgirl]

Are you the guy by St. Cloud?

 

[bigdessert]

Nope, further north....aitkin.

 

[callthatgirl]

omy, I'm so jealous! I wish I lived by Mille Lac. Gorgeous up there.

 

[bigdessert]

I live where most of you "citiots" vacation......sorry for the pun....we have many names up here for you folk down in the cities.

 

[callthatgirl]

I'm far from a cidiot. When I go up north, I take all the back roads--haha. I rarely go though because where I live there is tons of beauty, equal to your area. I live close the Miss River.

 

[bigdessert]

was just messing around with ya. I have a few clients down in the cities....I hate going there....real frustrating with the traffic.

 

[callthatgirl]

That's ok

What other names do you call us? What kind of operation do you have in Aitkin?

 

[bigdessert]

I'll pm....we have killed your thread....sorry

 

[LukeD]

Did you give them a script or do they just take a message?

 

[donte10]

I'm sure if they get you 2 extra invoices a month, you break even and the service pays for itself. I deal with a company in MN. Maybe an employee would be another option.

 

[callthatgirl]

They have script options and you can have messages sent to different techs. I kinda like that feature. Some of my clients told me that "I had the nicest lady answer the phone" lol.

 

[Steve202]

I'm using a company in the UK. Its a pay as you go service and the more money you spend when topping up, the cheaper it is. They charge per call and not by the minute, so I can keep an eye on the cost.

 

[Chadhardy]

I'm looking into this as well, and after doing a little research I found this company

http://www.voicenation.com/live-answering.shtml

You can see their pricing here: http://www.qualityansweringservice.com/pricing-made-simple

They are the only ones that seem to bundle in a lot of extra features that other places charge a-la-carte.

May be worth a look!

 

[AlaDes]

One other option you could do is to forward all your calls to one of your tech's phone when leaving the office. I'm not sure what call forwarding would cost you but it only costs me about $3 extra per month. Heck, for those prices, I'm sure one of your techs would be willing to just answer the phone during after hours, especially when they don't have to be there to do so. You could even rotate your techs to where each one had to pull a Sunday answering service and commission them for it

 

[Cornerstone Technologies]

One other option you could do is to forward all your calls to one of your tech's phone when leaving the office. I'm not sure what call forwarding would cost you but it only costs me about $3 extra per month. Heck, for those prices, I'm sure one of your techs would be willing to just answer the phone during after hours, especially when they don't have to be there to do so. You could even rotate your techs to where each one had to pull a Sunday answering service and commission them for it

This is what I do, and it doesnt cost any extra, though this will depend on your provider. I have also thought about getting an answering service, but the fees around here are pretty much rape as they tend to do medical offices primarily. Rotating the phone to techs is a good idea, though from experience, I would only do this to a company owned phone. Years ago, I worked for a call center where we did this. Turns out that a guy wasnt answering the calls on his days, but if the call was forwarded, it would have been missed. I am not saying your techs are like that, but I have learned to keep my expectations low and be pleasantly surprised when I am proved wrong.

 

[callthatgirl]

Chad, that's the company I am using right now. I ended up in the "middle" of the $230 and $430 plan.



I did sign the deal for the shopping mall place and we are getting 2 phone lines. I will work them out so if one is missed, it flips to the other phone and that one should never go to voicemail as I have 5 people located there.

Then I just have nights and weekends, but that store is open Saturday and Sundays, so I can hope. I am glad no one gets my voicemail anymore, but $315 is steep holy crap.

@corner....my main tech who does the calls with me never misses a call if he can help it, but he also doesn't take the blackberry home. And I don't want it either all night and weekends lol

btw...I just got dumped the other day because the new guy I was seeing didn't know I owned a company (just started dating) and he got my service when I missed a call. He said he wasn't into dating women that had so much going on in their lives.

 

[andcorptech]

Im in Australia and I use a phone voicemail service from a company called Zintel. I send them a wav file with my message in it and divert all missed/busy calls to the message service number they gave me. Then when a customer leaves a message for me it emails it to me as a wav file attachment. I pay $11.00 per 200 minutes of messages left each month, so this is an awesome service. If I go over 200 minutes then I pay another $11.00 for 200 minutes more until the end of the month. So far I have never gone over the first allotment of time each month.

I know its not the same as an actual person answering the call, but its a hell of alot better than missing messages or having to check voicemail, as I now have it emailed to one PC at work, to my home PC and to my phone, so I never miss a call now.

FYI, the AVM Fritzbox 7390 router I have at home has the same functionality built into the actual router, but the Zintel service is working so well for me Im hesitant to change it for my work system.

If you are looking into this , you should seriously check the Fritzbox router out as an option as it has some really nice Voice ( both PSTN and VOIP) features , as well as much more.

 

[andcorptech]

btw...I just got dumped the other day because the new guy I was seeing didn't know I owned a company (just started dating) and he got my service when I missed a call. He said he wasn't into dating women that had so much going on in their lives.

Wow, I just read that part, what an a$$hole. You probably dodged a bullet on that one though as It seems like he may not be able to handle such a successful woman