Comparison
What an AI answering service costs a plumbing or HVAC shop
The short answer
Anywhere from $49 to $3,500 a month, and the spread is real rather than a difference in quality. Rosie starts at $49 flat with unlimited minutes, Jobber's AI Receptionist is $99, Sameday publishes $449 for 500 minutes, and Avoca is quote-only at an estimated $1,000 to $3,500. What you are buying at each rung is integration depth.
Why the range is so wide
A seventy-fold price spread usually means the products are different things wearing the same label, and that is exactly what is happening here. At the bottom you are buying a voice that answers and takes a message. At the top you are buying something that knows your dispatch board.
The other reason is billing units. Flat monthly, per minute, per call and per booked job all exist in this category, and vendors pick the unit that flatters them. A $49 flat plan and a $449 plan for 500 minutes are not comparable until you know how many minutes you actually use.
The ladder, by shop size
All prices as of late 2026 and worth re-checking, because this category is moving fast.
What each rung buys
- One to three trucks: Rosie at $49 a month flat, unlimited minutes. Answers, takes details, texts you. No dispatch integration
- Already on Jobber: the AI Receptionist add-on at $99 a month, included on the roughly $440 Teams Plus plan. Books into the calendar you already use
- Four to ten trucks: Sameday AI at $449 a month for 500 minutes or $789 for 1,000, with native ServiceTitan, Housecall Pro and Jobber integrations
- Already on Housecall Pro: CSR AI is quote-only, third parties estimate $200 to $500 and up, and some contractors report per-minute billing
- Ten trucks and up: Avoca is quote-only and independently estimated at $1,000 to $3,500 a month billed per minute
What actually changes as you climb
The cheap tier answers and records. That solves the worst version of the problem, which is a caller reaching nothing at all, but somebody on your team still turns the message into a booking tomorrow morning.
The middle tier books. It can see your calendar, offer real slots and write the job in. This is the step that removes work rather than deferring it, and it is where most shops with a full schedule should be looking.
The top tier routes intelligently. It knows an emergency from a maintenance call, which technician covers which zone, and what you charge. That is worth $2,000 a month if you are running enough calls that dispatch decisions cost you money, and it is a waste otherwise.
The cheap tier answers. The middle tier books. The top tier decides who goes.
The benchmark to price against
Before comparing AI products to each other, compare them to a human. Smith.ai, which is human-staffed, runs about $9.75 a call. That is the number to hold in your head.
Now count your inbound calls. A shop taking 150 calls a month would pay roughly $1,460 for human answering. Against that, $449 for AI looks strong and $49 looks like a rounding error. A shop taking 30 calls a month would pay $293 for humans, and suddenly the $449 AI plan is worse value than a person.
This is the calculation most vendors would rather you did not do. Below about fifty calls a month, cheap flat-rate AI or a human service usually beats a mid-tier AI subscription.
What to check before you sign
The demo will be a clean call from someone who knows what to say. Your callers will be in a loud van, mid-sentence, or furious about water on a floor.
Push on these
- Ask to hear a call it handled badly, not a highlight reel
- Confirm whether it books into your software or only takes a message
- Find out the billing unit and what an average client actually paid last month
- Ask what happens at 2am with a genuine emergency
- Check whether it uses your number or an unfamiliar one
- Ask about contract length and whether your call recordings leave with you
The cheaper move to try first
Before any of this, work out how many calls you are actually missing. Most shops guess high or low by a wide margin, and the answer changes which rung you need.
Invoca's data puts unanswered inbound calls at about 27% for home services, with fewer than 3% of voicemail callers leaving a message. If your number is near that, an answering product pays for itself quickly. If you are answering 95% of calls because someone is always at a desk, you have a lead volume problem rather than a phone problem, and no receptionist fixes that.
The cheapest partial fix remains missed call text back at $30 to $80 a month. It does not answer the phone, but it stops the silent loss, and running it for a month gives you a real count of how many people you were missing before you commit to anything larger.
Common questions
- What is the cheapest AI answering service for a trade business?
- Rosie starts at $49 a month flat with unlimited minutes as of late 2026. If you already use Jobber, its AI Receptionist add-on at $99 a month may be better value because it books into the calendar you already run.
- Is AI answering cheaper than a human service?
- It depends on volume. Human-staffed Smith.ai runs about $9.75 a call. Below roughly fifty calls a month a human service often costs less than a mid-tier AI subscription. Above that, AI wins on price quickly.
- Will it book jobs or just take messages?
- That is the question that separates the tiers. Cheap plans record a message somebody actions later. Mid-tier plans see your calendar and book real slots. Ask specifically, because vendors describe both as answering your phone.
- How do I know if I need one?
- Count your missed calls first. Home-service businesses miss around 27% of inbound calls on average, and under 3% of voicemail callers leave a message. If you are near that, the maths is easy. If you answer nearly everything, your problem is lead volume.
- What is the catch with quote-only pricing?
- Quote-only usually means per-minute billing, which makes your cost a function of how chatty your callers are. Ask what an average client of your size paid last month, not what the plan costs.