AI front desk
What the assistant can and can’t do
A precise list, so you know when to expect a person to step in.
It can
| Task | Details |
|---|---|
| Find open times | Up to 3 options at a time, over the next 14 days; tries other team members if the requested one is busy, and prefers the client’s usual person. |
| Hold a time | Keeps it for 10 minutes by default while the client decides. Needs the client’s name first. |
| Confirm a booking | Or send a deposit link, or send a request for your approval — depending on your rules. |
| List a client’s appointments | And say up front whether each one can still be moved or cancelled, and why. |
| Move an appointment | To another offered time for the same service, within your rules. |
| Cancel an appointment | After confirming with the client, and telling them what happens to any deposit. |
| Add to the waitlist | For a service, optionally a person, over the next 30 days at most. |
| Save client details | Name, phone, preferred language, and permission for text reminders. A number typed in another chat gets a “Reply YES” text first — see Consent. |
| Verify a phone number | By texting a 6-digit code — needed before acting on appointments booked under another number. |
| Answer questions | Prices, services, hours, address, your policies and your FAQ answers. |
| Hand off to a person | Whenever it should — see Hand-offs & pausing. |
It can’t
- Promise refunds, discounts, waived fees or deposits, free services, price matches or exceptions.
- Give medical or allergy advice.
- Book times the calendar didn’t offer, or bend your booking rules. (Your team can — the rules for clients don’t apply to staff.)
- Book more upcoming appointments for one client than your limit (3 by default). It hands the chat to your team instead.
- Book a service you’ve marked “the assistant can’t book this”. It offers to connect the client with your team.
- See photos. (Voice notes are fine: they’re turned into text.)
- See or share another client’s details, or your team’s private notes.
- Message people who haven’t written to you, outside the channel rules and their permissions.
Guided mode (no AI)
The assistant switches to guided mode — clear buttons instead of free conversation — when:
- your plan doesn’t include the AI front desk — for example, after the trial moves you to Free;
- the month’s AI conversations are used up and keep going is off (every chat, until next month);
- one conversation has reached its daily limit (that conversation only);
- the whole business has reached its daily limit (every chat, until usage drops);
- no AI is available.
In guided mode clients can book, see their appointments, cancel, ask about hours and prices, get FAQ answers, and ask for a person.
Note
Guided mode can’t reschedule or add people to the waitlist. Clients who need that are offered a person.
Ask: your back-office assistant
Ask in the sidebar is a separate assistant for you, not for clients. It answers questions about your business — “What’s open tomorrow?”, “Who’s due back?”, “How was this week?” — by looking up your schedule, open times, clients, results and conversations that need you.
- It is read-only: it never changes anything. When you ask it to act, it points you to the Calendar, Inbox or Customers.
- Owners and Managers, on the Front Desk plan. On other plans, the page offers quick answers to common questions, no AI needed.