Cost

What an after-hours answering service costs

By Daniel Graham, founder of AgentHive Inc, Palm Coast, Florida. 25 years in enterprise IT and telecom.

Checked October 4, 2026. Every dollar figure on this page is tied to a public page. Nothing here is an average we calculated, and nothing is a vendor’s price copied from a review site. Where two pages disagree, both numbers are shown with their dates.

An after-hours answering service is sold three ways: by the minute, by the call, or as a flat month. The same 40 night calls can land on very different invoices depending on which of those you bought. First Deploy’s own price is the flat one: $1,750 setup, then $250 a month.

Per minute

Hey Rosie’s June 25, 2025 article, still the page at that URL on October 4, 2026, says answering-service pricing can range from $0.25 per minute to $3 or more per minute, depending on volume, hours, and contract length. That is their stated range, not a quote from one carrier’s rate card.

Ruby sells minutes in a monthly bundle rather than as a running per-minute meter. Ruby’s 2026 cost guide says virtual receptionist plans start at $250 per month for 50 minutes and go up to $1,725 per month for 500 minutes. Their plans page shows 50, 100, 200, and 500 minute tiers and prints $1,725 on the 500-minute tier. It also says there is no extra fee for activation, onboarding, or setup. The 100-minute and 200-minute prices were not in the text of that page when it was read, so they are left out. More on that comparison is on First Deploy vs Ruby.

Hey Rosie notes that some services bill a full minute even when the call lasted a few seconds. A minute bundle and a per-minute rate are not the same quote.

Per call

Smith.ai publishes two per-call lists. On the AI Receptionist page, read October 4, 2026:

  • Free: $0 a month, 25 calls, then $3.00 per call.
  • Pro: from $150 a month, shown as $2.00 per call. Included-call steps are 75, 150, and 300, with per-call rates of $2.00, $1.80, and $1.67. Extra calls are $2.50, $2.30, and $2.17.
  • Enterprise: from $500 a month, shown as $1.67 per call. Steps are 300, 500, and 1,000+, with rates of $1.67, $1.60, and Custom.

On the live receptionist page the same day: 30 calls for $300 a month ($11.50 over), 90 calls for $810 ($10.50 over), and 300 calls for $2,100 ($8.50 over). Those plans say there is no setup fee. Appointment booking on that page is an add-on at $1.50 per call. The AI plan and the live plan are different products. First Deploy vs Smith.ai keeps them separate.

A per-call price does not change because the caller talked for two minutes or twelve. It does change because you answered more calls. Smith.ai’s AI page says that is intentional. A shop that gets a burst of storm calls should price the overage, not only the included bundle.

Flat month, and per agent

Goodcall’s pricing page does not charge for minutes or for the number of calls. The plans read on October 4, 2026 are $79, $129, and $249 a month (Starter and Growth are per agent). The annual view on the same page shows $66, $108, and $208 next to a “15% off” label. Starter includes 100 unique customers, then $0.50 each. Growth includes 250, then $0.50. Scale includes 500 unique customers; the $0.50 line was not printed on that card. Their June 26, 2026 page says setup takes minutes and that there is a 14-day trial with no long-term contract. First Deploy vs Goodcall has the plan limits.

Hey Rosie’s cost article says Rosie AI pricing starts at $49 per month, including message-taking, spam detection, and English and Spanish. That sentence is theirs, on the June 25, 2025 article. It is one vendor’s published starting price, not a market average.

Housecall Pro’s guide, updated July 30, 2026, says that according to AMBS Call Center’s 2025 price guide, most live answering plans for small businesses cost $135 to $400 per month. The same guide summarizes AI answering as $0 to $200 per month depending on usage. Those are the ranges they published, attributed to that guide.

First Deploy is a flat month after a setup fee. Setup is $1,750. You can start with 50% ($875) and pay the balance at completion, or pay $1,750 in full. The desk is $250 a month per company, starting at go-live, invoiced separately. It is not a minute bundle and not a call bundle. Cancel the month and the line goes dark. That is the whole price on the pricing page.

What a person on payroll costs, as others cite it

These are wages the same articles cite, not answering-service invoices.

  • Housecall Pro’s July 30, 2026 guide cites the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics: a median $17.90 per hour, or $37,230 per year, in 2024, before taxes and benefits.
  • Ruby’s cost guide cites that same median (about $37,000 a year) and Salary.com: an average receptionist salary of $41,622 as of May 2026, with a loaded cost they put at roughly $52,000 to $58,000. Their table lists $3,469 a month in-house next to $1,725 for the 500-minute plan.
  • Hey Rosie cites a different BLS figure: a mean annual wage of $36,590, and $47,360 at the 90th percentile. Mean and median are not the same number. Both stay as published.

Housecall Pro’s guide separates the two jobs: an in-house receptionist for walk-ins and daily admin, an answering service for missed calls, nights, and overflow.

How to read a quote

Minutes reward short calls. Ruby’s published steps are the concrete version: 50 minutes is not 500 minutes. Calls ignore length and follow volume, and Smith.ai’s AI overage is not the live-plan overage. A flat month still has the cap that page prints: Goodcall’s unique-customer allowance, or First Deploy’s one company at $250. Setup is $0 on Smith.ai’s live plans and on Ruby’s “no setup fee” line, and it is $1,750 on First Deploy. Add it once. The Smith.ai, Ruby, and Goodcall pages read for this article include nights in the 24/7 language.

The flat desk for a trade shop is on First Deploy pricing. Vendor notes: vs Smith.ai, vs Ruby, vs Goodcall. The night-call script is the after-hours playbook.

Sources