What does each one cost in the UK?
Human call answering is priced per call, per minute, or as a monthly bundle, and the two biggest names publish no rate card at all. Pocket Receptionist lists £75 a month for 30 calls with extra calls at £2.99, covering 08:00 to 20:00. Face For Business starts at £49 a month with an inclusive-minutes plan from £115. AnswerConnect advertises plans from £45 a month, and ReceptionHQ takes messages from £15 a month with per-call fees on top. alldayPA and Moneypenny quote per customer.
Kalvo is a flat £49 a month for 100 call minutes, with £99 and £199 plans above that, and 24/7 answering included on every plan. There is no per-call fee inside your plan, so a busy week costs the same as a quiet one. The full UK cost guide sets out every figure with its source.
What can a human service do that AI cannot?
Exercise judgment beyond the brief, and be a person. A good agent can sense that a caller is distressed, improvise around an unusual request, and carry the kind of conversation some callers simply want a human for. If your calls are sensitive or legally delicate, that is worth paying for, and an answering service is the right choice.
Be honest about how many of your calls are like that. For most small businesses the phone traffic is prices, opening hours, bookings and messages. On those calls a scripted agent takes a message for you to act on later, while an AI receptionist resolves the call there and then. Kalvo also transfers genuine emergencies to a person, so the human backstop stays in the loop where it matters.
What can an AI receptionist do that a human service cannot?
Answer every call at once, at any hour, for a flat price. No human team can put an agent on five simultaneous Friday-afternoon calls without queueing someone, and no per-call pricing model gets cheaper when your phone gets busier. Software does both without noticing.
It also finishes the job on the call: real appointment times offered and confirmed, answers given from your own knowledge base rather than a static script, and a transcript with a summary in your inbox afterwards. The same receptionist runs your website chatbot and email, so every channel gives the same answers. A message-taking service hands you a note; Kalvo hands you a booking.
So which should you choose?
Choose a human answering service if your calls regularly need human judgment on the line and you are comfortable paying per call for it. Choose an AI receptionist if what you need is every call answered, common questions handled, and bookings made, at a price that does not climb with your call volume.
The honest test is a week of your own calls. Kalvo goes live in minutes on your existing number, so you can run it on real calls and judge the transcripts yourself rather than take either side's word for it.