AI voice agents for small business: what they can and cannot do
An AI voice agent answers the phone, understands what the caller wants and replies out loud in the same call. For a small business that misses calls after hours or at peak times, it can be the difference between a booking and a lost customer. It is also easy to oversell. Here is an honest list of what to expect.
What a good agent can do
- Answer from your own documents. The useful ones retrieve answers from the company's documents (opening hours, prices, policies, frequently asked questions) instead of general knowledge, so they do not invent answers.
- Be interrupted. A caller can cut in mid-sentence and the agent stops straight away, like a person would.
- Book appointments and callbacks. It can take a booking during the call or schedule a callback for your team.
- Hand over to a person, with context, when the case calls for it, so the caller does not repeat everything.
- Send a confirmation by email. In Alpire the agent can email the caller one of the organisation's own templates (a confirmation, a quote, a link), filling in the details from the conversation. It cannot write free text, and it confirms the address with the caller first.
What it cannot (or should not) do
- Replace judgement. Angry customers, sensitive complaints and high-value decisions belong with a person. Design the handover on purpose; see when and how an AI voice agent should hand a call to a person (in Spanish).
- Know what you never told it. If the answer is not in its documents, the right behaviour is to say so and hand over, not to guess.
- Be free. AI is billed per minute while it is on the call. Transcription, the language model and the voice each have a price; a full explanation of the cost is in how much an AI voice call really costs (in Spanish).
Things that are specific to Alpire
Alpire is a cloud phone system (PBX) with optional AI voice agents. A few facts that decide whether it fits:
- Inbound AI is available on every plan. Outbound AI campaigns start at the Pro plan.
- You can switch it on gradually: for one number, one queue, or only outside business hours.
- You choose the speech-to-text, the language model and the voice per call, and can change them without touching code. The voice never switches provider or country on its own, not even to recover from a failure.
- An EU AI Act disclosure is announced and logged before the agent speaks; the text is configurable per organisation.
- Alpire does not sell phone numbers. You bring your own SIP trunk, Twilio or Telnyx.
- It is not an SMS or WhatsApp channel. Besides voice it offers website chatbots and transactional email from call flows.
What it costs, in rough terms
One AI minute costs roughly 4.8 credits with the cheapest combination of providers and about 16.2 with the most expensive. Each plan refills a monthly bag of AI credits, and the 14-day trial includes 300 credits, which is roughly 19 to 63 minutes of conversation. Prices per seat are listed in the pricing section.
Where to start
Do not switch on everything at once. Pick one number, outside business hours, load the agent with the ten questions you answer every day, and listen to the first week of calls. Fix the documents, adjust the handover, and widen the scope when the answers hold up.
You can follow a sample call with an agent (the conversation is recorded for the demonstration, no model is answering) in the public demo without creating an account, and start a 14-day trial when you are ready.