FrontDesk comes with a built-in Setup Assistant, the floating orb in the corner of the app. It's there to help you (the person running the practice), and it does two things well: it answers questions and it makes changes for you, either by voice or by typing.
This is different from your AI phone receptionist, which answers your callers. The Setup Assistant helps you operate FrontDesk.
Open it and pick voice or text
Click the floating orb to open the assistant. You can:
- Type your question or request, or
- Turn on Voice mode and just talk out loud.
Settings → Account → Assistant has Voice mode, Auto-greet (it opens with a proactive message), Skip confirm on safe changes, Save voice transcripts, the assistant's name and orb color, and Show assistant for me to hide it for your login.
Ask it anything
For any "how do I…" or "what is…" question, the assistant searches the FrontDesk help center and answers with the relevant guide. Try "How do I port my number?", "What is A2P?", or "How does billing work?" It can also tell you about your own account:
- "What's my setup?": your current configuration and what's left to finish.
- "What calls came in today?": recent call logs, with the summary, transcript, and outcome of any call.
- "What does my day look like?": today's appointments and your next upcoming one.
- "Are my calls/texts working?": a phone-health check (voice/SMS flags, A2P status).
- "What am I being charged?" / "How much of my plan have I used?": billing and usage summaries.
Let it make changes for you
This is where it saves the most time. Just ask, and the assistant can:
- Find and buy a phone number ("get me a number in the 480 area code"). Buying one is for owners and admins of that location, the same as buying on the Phone setup page.
- Change your voice or greeting, and preview a voice before you switch.
- Set your business hours and your after-hours message.
- Add, rename, or remove a service / appointment type, and set a service's price.
- Add a knowledge entry or import facts from your website, and set the insurance you accept.
- Add a holiday closure, a provider, or call transfer to a person.
- Find open slots, and reschedule or cancel an appointment.
- Reply by text to a patient who already has a text conversation with you (it never texts a new number).
- Turn online booking on or off and set up reminders.
- Return a missed call with a click-to-call (it rings your phone, then bridges to the caller).
- Invite a teammate by their email address. It gives you the invitation link to send them (no email goes out), and tells you if they're already on your team.
- Toggle voicemail or call recording, or pause the AI receptionist temporarily. While it's paused, every call goes to voicemail at any hour, after hours too, and Settings → Phone & SMS → Calls shows Paused: calls go to voicemail under Who answers, with a Resume button under it. Resuming there, or asking the assistant to resume, puts back exactly what you had before the pause, day and night.
- Give you the number to call for a test, and notice when your test call comes in.
- Take you to any page ("show me my call logs", "open billing") and switch between locations.
Every change is previewed and reversible
You stay in control:
- The assistant shows a preview card of exactly what it's about to do.
- Nothing happens until you approve it.
- For reversible changes, just say "undo" and it puts back the last one it made, typed or in Voice mode, and only what that change touched. Anything you changed in Settings since stays as it is.
If you'd rather not confirm every small, safe change, turn on "Skip confirm on safe changes" in the Assistant settings. Low-risk reversible actions then apply immediately.
Assistant Memory
The assistant remembers stable facts between conversations so you don't repeat yourself: your preferred name, your scheduling philosophy, a recurring instruction like "always greet patients formally." Manage it under Settings → Account → Assistant → Memory:
- Pin / unpin: pinned memories are always loaded; you can unpin ones you don't need.
- Delete anything you no longer want it to know.
- Each memory is tagged Just me, This practice (this location) or All locations.
For privacy, the assistant won't store things like phone numbers, emails, or ID numbers in memory.
When you're stuck
If something isn't working or you'd rather talk to a person, say "I need help" and the assistant opens a support ticket for a human teammate to follow up. See Contact support.
Owner controls
The organization owner can turn Enable for entire organization on or off in the Assistant settings. Turning it off hides the assistant for every team member.