Recommend me a good Virtual PA/Call Answering service
Recommend me a good Virtual PA/Call Answering service
Author
Discussion

crosseyedlion

Original Poster:

2,315 posts

214 months

Tuesday 11th October 2016
quotequote all
Hi all

I'm on the lookout for a British Virtual PA/Call answering service for taking calls, saying im busy/out of the office/on a call during working hours then emailing me a message to call them back (and who).

I want someone who isn't clearly a call centre and can chat with the clients a little (its a luxury product).

Too much to ask/ Any recommendations?

Cheers

Rutter

2,076 posts

222 months

Tuesday 11th October 2016
quotequote all
A client of ours use http://theofficegenie.co.uk/ they seem ok from what little contact I have had with them.

jamescodriver

400 posts

209 months

Tuesday 11th October 2016
quotequote all

bga

8,134 posts

267 months

Tuesday 11th October 2016
quotequote all
We used a few agencies when we were smaller with the best being answer-4u.

Like all services, the more you put in the more you get out. 99.5% of our inbound calls are businesses trying to flog stuff to us but the 0.5% that are potential customers have to not feel like they have hit a gatekeeper. We spent some time preparing scripts & were impressed by how the call handlers worked through them quite naturally.

NeilOak

22 posts

112 months

Tuesday 11th October 2016
quotequote all
We've used Answer 4U, now known as Your Business Voice for about 10 years.

Happy to recommend them.

jeremyc

26,121 posts

300 months

Tuesday 11th October 2016
quotequote all
Vikki Stewart at Media Confidential and NEDConfidential is excellent.

Vikki's LinkedIn profile said:
Current and former clients include Richard Eyre CBE, Sir Peter Bazalgette, Hilary Newiss, Lord Jim O'Neill, Baroness Tessa Jowell, Alex Graham, Sian Westerman, Carolyn Fairbairn, Nicholas Prettejohn, Caroline Goodall, Genevieve Shore, Stewart Easterbrook, Alex Mahon, Jane Featherstone, Abi Morgan, Claire Tavernier, Caroline Ross, Patrick Walker, Dame Sue Street, Simon Shaps, Anthony Fry, Phil Wall, Doug McCallum, John Whittle, Geoff Miller, Robin Freestone, Ashley MacKenzie, Angela Hartnett, Sonita Alleyne, Mike Emmerich, Ben Lucas, Sarah Whitney, Rohan Silva, Sam Aldenton, Emma Sinclair, Andrea Blance and Bill Roedy.
Edited by jeremyc on Tuesday 11th October 20:58

Herbs

4,988 posts

245 months

Thursday 13th October 2016
quotequote all
allpaypa have always been very good with no drama for me - used them at a few places now.

hyphen

26,262 posts

106 months

Monday 10th June 2019
quotequote all
Bump for 2019.

Can someone recommend one? One that filters out some calls rather than forwarding everything would be good.

Thanks

vdn

9,154 posts

219 months

Thursday 13th June 2019
quotequote all
Miss Moneypenny for us. Very good service.

cerberaperv

83 posts

141 months

Sunday 23rd June 2019
quotequote all
We’ve used Answer.co.uk for the past 5yrs.

They filter out sales calls and I’ve found them cheaper than the others we’ve previously used. Their customer service and platform is good too.

jammy-git

29,778 posts

228 months

Sunday 23rd June 2019
quotequote all
vdn said:
Miss Moneypenny for us. Very good service.
Use Moneypenny myself. Their apps are very good too.

GlenMH

5,355 posts

259 months

Monday 24th June 2019
quotequote all
We use TelePA and as others have said, working on scripts etc with them up front has been very beneficial.

Pot Bellied Fool

2,213 posts

253 months

Wednesday 26th June 2019
quotequote all
I use Liscard Business Centre - if you tell them to filter stuff out then they will. Small team but cover clients all over the UK.

I used to have a physical office there but I've now moved on - they still do my virtual office & phone answering though. Spot on folk. Tell 'em Duncan sent ya!

Edited by Pot Bellied Fool on Wednesday 26th June 16:41

mx stu

829 posts

239 months

Tuesday 23rd March 2021
quotequote all
Just bumping this up to see if there has any updated recommendations here.

We are starting to think what our post pandemic office looks like and whether we can outsource reception duties (no visitors and client meetings, before Covid, were normally held off site or a Regus office in London). The current person in this role also acts as a PA to someone who is likely to retire in the next 6 months so it's looking hard to justify their salary to answer a handful of calls a week.

Also anyone have an idea of costs here? We are <10 people and I'd be surprised if there are more than 20 (unexpected) calls a week, of which 75% are probably sales calls that it'd be good to block out.

Mortgage_tom

1,462 posts

242 months

Tuesday 12th October 2021
quotequote all
Bump again,

Got a quote from Moneypenny

£35+VAT then 3p a second minimum 0.90p a call.

Finding them a bit frustrating as they are advertising £20pcm, bombarding their offer with telephone features which I've no interest in, it's making it difficult to pin them down a simple answering service amongst all the feature marketing. I'm asking for a call answering service, not a phone system, auto-attendant, call forwarding, etc.... I find companies that overcomplicate and don't get to the point untrustworthy and unnecessarily difficult.

What about these others that have been recomened on Pistonheads previously:

https://www.answer-4u.com/

and

https://www.answer.co.uk/

I already like the plain offer from answer.co.uk, anyone use them?



Edited by Mortgage_tom on Tuesday 12th October 12:04

Al Gorithum

4,644 posts

224 months

Tuesday 12th October 2021
quotequote all