A call answering service is a team of outsourced receptionists who answer your business calls for you. You divert your line to them, they answer live in your company name using your script, then take a message, transfer the call, book an appointment or answer common questions. You get a summary of every call by email or SMS.
Picture the phone ringing while you are with a client, up a ladder or halfway through a meeting. With a call answering service, that call does not drop into voicemail. A trained receptionist picks it up in your company name, deals with the caller and sends you the details. This guide explains how the arrangement works in practice, what it can handle and how to decide whether it suits your business.
What a call answering service actually is
A call answering service is an outsourced team of receptionists who answer your business calls on your behalf. You keep your own number. Calls are routed to the service, either all the time or only when you cannot get to the phone, and a real person answers using a greeting you have agreed in advance.
To the caller, it feels like reaching your own front desk. The industry norm is that callers are not told they are speaking to an outsourced service unless you choose to tell them. We look at this in more detail in whether callers will know they are speaking to an answering service.
You will also see the same idea described as a telephone answering service, a virtual receptionist or outsourced call handling. The labels overlap, although there are real differences between a personal receptionist service and a high-volume call centre, which we explain in our comparison of virtual receptionists and call centres.
How it works, step by step
- Set-up and scripting. You tell the provider about your business: what you do, who usually calls, what they tend to ask and what should happen next. The provider turns this into a greeting, a script and a call flow.
- Diverting your calls. You forward your line to the service. On a BT Business line, for example, call diversion is an added feature with separate codes for diverting all calls, calls that are not answered and calls that arrive while you are engaged. Our guide on how to divert business calls to an answering service covers landlines, mobiles and cloud phone systems.
- Live answering. A receptionist answers in your company name, follows your script and deals with the caller.
- Action on the call. Depending on what you have agreed, they take a message, transfer the caller to you, book an appointment or answer a question.
- Your summary. You receive the details promptly, usually by email or SMS, so you can decide what happens next.
What a receptionist can do on your behalf
A good answering service does far more than write down a name and number. Typical tasks include:
- Taking detailed messages and sending them to you after every call
- Transferring urgent or important calls to you or a colleague
- Booking appointments into your diary
- Answering frequently asked questions about your services
- Qualifying new enquiries so you know which leads to call back first
- Making outbound calls on your behalf, such as confirming bookings
Transfers are worth understanding. With a warm transfer, the receptionist puts the caller on hold, calls you, explains who is on the line and why, then connects you. With a cold or blind transfer, the caller is put straight through with no introduction. Warm transfers mean nobody lands in voicemail or reaches someone who has no idea why they are calling.
Full cover or overflow: choosing how you use it
You do not have to hand over every call. Most services can be set up in one of several ways, and you can change the arrangement as your business changes.
| Approach | How calls reach the service | Often suits |
|---|---|---|
| Full cover | All calls are diverted, so the service acts as your front desk | Sole traders and small teams who are rarely at a desk |
| Overflow on no answer | Calls divert if nobody picks up within a set number of rings | Offices that want to answer first but never miss a call |
| Overflow when busy | Calls divert when your line is engaged | Teams that get several calls at once |
| Scheduled divert | Calls divert at set times, such as lunchtime or after hours | Businesses with predictable gaps in cover |
If you only want help at peak times, read our guide to using a call answering service only when you are busy.
Who uses a call answering service?
Any business where a missed call could mean a missed customer. That includes solicitors taking new enquiries, clinics booking patients, letting agents handling viewings and tradespeople who spend the day on site. For a construction firm or trades business, it means you can keep working without losing the next job to whoever answered first.
Professional firms often use it to make sure new clients reach a person straight away. As one law firm client, Clarity Simplicity Ltd, puts it: "We know that getting the phone answered quickly just needs to happen, or we lose."
What to check before you sign up
Services vary a lot, so it pays to compare more than the headline price. Ask each provider:
- How pricing works. Per call, per minute, bundles or a flat monthly fee, and whether there are set-up fees or charges for spam calls. Our guide to how much a telephone answering service costs breaks this down.
- Who answers. Where the receptionists are based and whether they work as a small team that gets to know you or as rotating call centre agents.
- How messages reach you. Email, SMS, an app or a combination.
- How your data is handled. Under UK GDPR, you are normally the controller and the answering service is your processor, so ask for a data processing agreement.
For a fuller list, see the questions to ask before choosing a call answering service, and our earlier article on how to choose a virtual receptionist service.
How Onwards Answering works
Onwards Answering receptionists are based in Scotland and work from home, not in a call centre, supported by team leads and client managers. Calls are answered live during business hours in your company name, using scripts and greetings built around your business. Outside standard working hours, a voicemail service can be attached to your number at no extra charge.
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 can try the service with a free 2 week trial, and prices start from £72 per month with no per-call charges. See the full details on our prices and plans page, or get in touch with the team to talk through how it would work for you.
Frequently asked questions
Is a call answering service the same as a virtual receptionist?
The terms overlap and many providers use them interchangeably. Both describe outsourced receptionists who answer your calls in your company name. A virtual receptionist service usually suggests more personalised handling, such as booking appointments and transferring calls, rather than simply taking messages as a basic answering service might.
Do I need a new phone number to use an answering service?
No. In most cases you keep your existing number and divert calls to the service using your phone provider's call diversion or forwarding settings. Some providers, including Onwards Answering, also offer an optional business number if you want to keep work and personal calls separate.
Can I choose which calls go to the answering service?
Yes. You can divert every call, only calls you do not answer within a set number of rings, only calls that arrive when your line is busy, or calls at scheduled times such as lunchtime. This lets you use the service as full cover or purely as overflow.