Powered Now, the UK software company built for trade businesses, has launched Powered Now Receptionist, designed to immediately engage with customers even when tradespeople are on the tools.

How It Works

The receptionist holds a natural conversation, asks the right questions for the job, on a ladder, under a boiler, or mid-job with no way to stop and pick up the phone, and books the appointment straight into the diary. By the time the tradesperson is free to check their phone, they’re not chasing a missed call, they’re looking at a job that’s already confirmed.

The Research Behind It

The product follows Powered Now’s NOW Report, national research into the working lives of UK tradespeople, which found that missed calls and slow admin are a significant driver of lost work, with many tradespeople losing jobs they never even knew existed because they couldn’t answer the phone in time. Powered Now commissioned the research specifically to understand the real problems and needs facing tradespeople day to day, and Powered Now Receptionist was built as a direct response to one of its central findings.

In addition, 33% of small businesses fail to answer incoming calls, and 69% of people who reach voicemail hang up without leaving a message — for a trade business where a single call can be worth £200 to £600 on average, that adds up to thousands of pounds in lost work a month. Separate international research puts the scale of the voicemail issue even higher, with 80% of callers who reach a business voicemail hanging up without leaving a message (Hiya).

What Tradespeople Are Saying

Robert Brown, of RB Electrical Services, has been using Powered Now Receptionist since it launched.

“Within the first week of using the receptionist, it answered six calls that would previously have gone to voicemail, and four of those turned into booked jobs. That’s a 66% conversion rate on work I’d have simply missed otherwise.”

Benjamin Dyer, CEO and Co-Founder of Powered Now, said:

“We built Powered Now Receptionist to address one of the clearest gaps our research uncovered — the moment a phone rings and nobody’s free to answer it. Now, no job needs to be missed due to a lost call. There’s no excuse for it to happen.”

Powered Now Receptionist moves the engagement with the customer one stage further forward and is part of the Powered Now offering. Tradespeople can now check out all the benefits and ease of use at www.powerednow.com/receptionist.