- A call answering service adds phone capacity as you grow without the fixed costs of a new employee.
- Hiring a receptionist means salary plus employer National Insurance, pension, holiday cover, recruitment and equipment.
- Onwards Answering has no per-call charges and reviews your package after 3 months against real call volumes.
- Owners win back time because every call ends with a summary by email or SMS.
A busy phone is a good problem to have. It means your marketing is working, word of mouth is spreading and people want what you sell. The trouble starts when calls arrive faster than you or your team can answer them.
Growth usually forces a choice: take on another member of staff, or accept that some calls will slip through. A call answering service gives you a third option for business growth. It adds capacity to your phones without adding a salary, a desk or a new set of fixed costs.
This guide looks at how outsourced call answering supports growth, what it really costs to add a receptionist instead, and how to keep a package in step with your call volumes.
Why Growth Puts Pressure on Your Phones
More customers means more calls: new enquiries, existing customers checking on progress, suppliers, and the usual run of sales pitches. Those calls rarely arrive evenly. A campaign goes live, a busy season starts or a large job lands, and the phone rings while everyone is already stretched.
When nobody picks up, callers do not always wait. Many people still prefer to speak to a person when an enquiry is urgent or valuable, and an unanswered call can easily become a call to a competitor. The more you grow, the more those missed calls are worth.
Adding Capacity When Call Volume Rises
A call answering service works as extra hands on your phone line. You can use it as the sole point of contact for your business, so every call is answered by the service, or as overflow cover that picks up only when your own team is busy or does not answer.
With Onwards Answering, receptionists answer in your company name, using scripts and greetings built around your business. They can:
- take detailed messages and pass them on straight after the call
- transfer calls to you or a colleague when you are available
- book appointments into your own calendar, or into Onwards' free secure booking platform
- answer common questions from a bank of FAQs built during your free trial
- make outbound calls on your behalf
If you want help turning those extra calls into new work, our business development service explains how the team can support your sales activity as well as your phones.
What It Costs to Add a Receptionist
The obvious alternative is to hire. Before you do, list everything that comes with a new employee, not just the salary. These are the main costs, using UK government figures:
- Salary: the National Careers Service puts a typical receptionist salary at £21,000 for a starter to £25,000 for an experienced receptionist a year.
- Minimum pay: from 1 April 2026 the National Living Wage is £12.71 an hour for workers aged 21 and over.
- Employer National Insurance: 15% on earnings above the secondary threshold of £5,000 a year, according to the rates and thresholds for employers 2026 to 2027.
- Pension: under workplace pension auto-enrolment, the minimum employer contribution is generally 3% of qualifying earnings.
- Holiday: most workers on a 5-day week are entitled to at least 28 days' paid leave a year, or 5.6 weeks, under statutory holiday entitlement.
- Hidden costs: recruitment, training, cover for sickness and holidays, a desk, equipment, a phone system and your own management time.
None of this means hiring is wrong. A receptionist who greets visitors and handles admin in person can be the right choice. But if the main job is answering the phone, these costs deserve a careful look. Our FAQ post on whether a call answering service is better than hiring a receptionist covers the decision in more depth.
Receptionist or Answering Service: Side by Side
The table below sets the facts next to each other. It does not add up totals, because your costs depend on hours, location and how you work.
| What you pay for | Adding a receptionist | Using Onwards Answering |
|---|---|---|
| Core cost | Salary, typically £21,000 to £25,000 a year | A monthly package, from £72 per month |
| Extra employer costs | Employer National Insurance at 15% above £5,000 a year, plus a pension contribution of generally at least 3% | No per-call charges and no inclusive-minutes bundles |
| Holidays and sickness | At least 28 days' paid leave a year, plus cover when they are off | Calls handled by a team of receptionists |
| Getting started | Recruitment, training, desk, equipment and phone system | Free 2 week trial while your scripts and FAQs are built |
| Changing capacity | Recruit again or change contracted hours | Package reviewed after 3 months against real call volumes |
| Outside working hours | Calls go unanswered unless you arrange cover | Live answering in business hours, with after-hours voicemail included |
Freeing Up the Owner's Time
In many small firms the owner is the receptionist by default. Every call interrupts a quote, a client meeting or a job on site, and the work that grows the business gets pushed into evenings and weekends.
Handing calls to a service changes that rhythm. After every call you receive a summary by email or SMS, and messages can also go to the Onwards Answering Connect app and portal. You choose when to deal with them, and urgent calls can still be transferred to you. Our guide to how you receive messages from a call answering service shows what that looks like day to day.
This matters most where the owner is also the person doing the work. Construction and trades businesses are a good example: it is hard to take a new enquiry properly from the top of a ladder.
They are saving businesses so much time. Plus, they are really cost effective and just great people to work with.
Grant, Denovo Legal Case Software Scotland
Flexible Packages That Grow With You
Pricing varies across the market. Some providers charge per call or per minute, others sell bundles that add charges once you go over. Onwards Answering works differently: there are no per-call charges, no inclusive-minutes bundles and no cap on how many calls are taken.
The team agrees a package with you at the start, based on your expected number of inbound calls. After 3 months they review your call volumes, including unwanted sales calls, and only discuss changing the package if there has been a sustained difference. A busy week does not change your bill, which makes the cost easy to plan around as you grow.
Answering more calls is only half of growth. The other half is turning callers into customers, which we cover in our article on capturing phone leads and converting them into sales.
A Team Behind Your Phone, Wherever You Trade
Onwards Answering is not a call centre. Its receptionists are based in Scotland and work from home, supported by team leads and client managers, and returning callers can be recognised. The service has answered over 1.8 million calls and is rated 4.8 out of 5 on Google.
Because calls simply divert to the team, where your business is based makes little difference. The service works the same whether you trade in Glasgow or Manchester, and it suits sole traders as well as growing teams.
Try Onwards Answering Before You Commit
If your phones are struggling to keep up with your growth, the simplest step is to test the difference. Onwards Answering offers a free 2 week trial, during which the team learns your business and builds your FAQs. After that, packages start from £72 per month with no per-call charges.
You can compare the options on our call handling prices and plans page, then decide whether an answering service fits your plans for the year ahead.
Frequently asked questions
Will a call answering service replace my staff?
It does not have to. Many businesses use it as overflow, so their own team answers first and the service picks up when lines are busy or calls are not answered. Others make it the main point of contact so staff can focus on work that brings in revenue.
What happens to my package if my call volumes grow?
With Onwards Answering, your package is agreed at the start based on your expected number of calls, with no per-call charges and no cap on calls taken. After 3 months the team reviews your volumes and only discusses a change if there has been a sustained difference.
Can a call answering service help when I am out on jobs?
Yes. Receptionists answer in your company name, take the caller's details and send you a summary by email or SMS after every call. Urgent calls can be transferred to you, and appointments can be booked into your calendar so nothing waits until you are back.