Every call to your number goes to one of four places, and you decide which on Settings → Phone & SMS, Calls tab, under Who answers.
The four choices
- AI receptionist: "Answers, books, and reschedules on its own." The default.
- Your team, in the app: "Calls ring in FrontDesk on the computer, no desk phone." When calling from the FrontDesk mobile app is turned on for your account, this reads Ring my team (web and app) and rings computers and phones together; the first person to answer takes the call.
- Forward to a phone: "Rings a cell or landline you name."
- Paused: calls go to voicemail: nobody is rung, and the AI answers no calls at any hour. Every caller hears your Voicemail Greeting and leaves a message, or the AI Voicemail Agent takes one if it's on. Asking the Setup Assistant to pause the AI receptionist chooses this. To resume, click the Resume button under it (or choose another option) and save. See Pausing and resuming below.
For the second and third, Ring Timeout sets how many seconds to ring before voicemail (30 by default, 10 to 120), the Voicemail switch records a message when nobody answers ("Record a voicemail if the call isn't answered"), and Voicemail Greeting replaces the default message (up to 500 characters). Paused has no ring timeout or Voicemail switch, since every call is recorded. See Handle voicemails.
To give nights and weekends their own handling, turn on Answer differently after hours; see Configure after-hours behavior.
Pausing and resuming
A pause covers every hour. While you're paused, the AI answers no calls, day or night, and nobody is rung: every caller can leave a message. With Answer differently after hours on, calls outside your hours go to voicemail too. They hear your after-hours message if nights were already set to Voicemail, and your Voicemail Greeting otherwise. Your choice on the Nights, weekends, holidays card stays as you set it, and it applies again when you resume.
Resuming puts back exactly what you had before the pause, day and night: the same choice under Who answers (the AI receptionist, your team, or a forwarded phone) and the same after-hours handling. On the Calls tab, the button under Paused says what comes back: Resume the AI receptionist, Resume ringing your team, or Resume forwarding to your phone. Click it, then save. Asking the Setup Assistant to resume does the same.
Also on the Calls tab:
- Staff lunch break: during the window you set, the AI won't transfer callers to a person; it takes a message so the team can call back after lunch.
- Play a recording notice: announces that the call may be recorded, either Only callers from states that require it or Every caller. See Understand call recording consent.
When the AI hands off to a person
With the AI answering, transfers are configured under Receptionist → AI Voice, Handing off to a person:
- Transfer to a human ("Callers can always ask for a person").
- Transfers go to: An outside number (enter it under Transfers ring) or My team, which rings the app and the web (whoever answers sees the caller and why the AI handed over; if nobody answers, the caller goes to voicemail).
- Announce to staff (outside number only): Connect immediately (no announcement), Whisper a short summary of the call, or Whisper a set phrase, typed under Staff hear.
- The transfer triggers, and Transfer instead of booking for practices that want a person to take every booking.
- Without a number, the AI takes a message instead of transferring.
Maximum call length (10 minutes by default) is on the same page; the AI ends a call that runs longer. See Call handling settings and Why did the AI transfer this call?.
Blocked callers
Numbers on your blocked list are rejected before any routing; see Block spam numbers.