AI receptionist for UK small businesses · UKHow EweCall cut AI receptionist setup from half a day to six minutes
Russell Goldthorpe runs EweCall, an AI receptionist for busy UK business owners who can't always get to the phone. He's got 30+ years in telecoms. One planning call and one build plan later, setting up a new customer's agent went from half a day to a few minutes.
- to set up each new agent, by hand, before
- Half a dayto set up each new agent, by hand, before
- from form to live agent now
- ~6 minfrom form to live agent now
- fastest go-live so far
- 4 minfastest go-live so far
- test score every agent needs before it goes live
- 88+test score every agent needs before it goes live
About EweCall
EweCall answers the calls you can't get to. Up a ladder, with a customer, driving between jobs. The AI receptionist picks up, captures the details, handles the enquiry and books the appointment, then gets it all straight to the owner.
Where they were
The product worked. The bottleneck was setup. Every new customer meant Russell building the agent by hand: writing the prompt, loading the business details, testing it, then getting it live. Half a day each, sometimes days end to end.
That's fine for a handful of customers. It doesn't work when you want 50 to 100 of them, and when the customer on the other end of the phone wants it working today.
What we did
- 01
One call, then a step-by-step plan
We spent an hour on what Russell wanted EweCall to do and where the time was going. Within a day he had a written build plan for his AI coworker: what to set up first, which integrations to connect and in what order.
- 02
A short form instead of a build
The customer, or one of EweCall's sales agents, fills in a form with five or six questions. The AI coworker writes the agent's prompt and sets it up in GoHighLevel from that. No blank page, no copy and paste.
- 03
Tested and scored before it goes live
Every agent gets text-tested automatically, then a few test calls, and each one is scored. Nothing goes live under 88. The coworker reviews live calls and tunes agents that are already running as well.
- 04
Payment and go-live in one message
When an agent passes, the customer gets a message with their test number and a GoCardless link to pay. The only manual step left is Russell allocating the phone number, and he gets a text when it's time.
- 05
Kept it cheap to run
The coworker uses the cheapest AI model that'll do each job, so a full build costs a couple of dollars in credits. That makes it easy to spin up an agent on the spot in front of a prospect.
- 06
Built the bits around it
While it was at it, the coworker wrote a 10-page onboarding guide for EweCall's sales agents. Next up: automatic customer value reports at 30 and 87 days, and chasing anyone who hasn't paid.
What changed
- Agent setup down from half a day to about six minutes. The fastest one went live in four.
- Sales agents can get a customer live while they're still on the call with them.
- Every agent is tested and scored before a customer hears it.
- Live agents get reviewed and improved without Russell digging through each account.
- Russell's time goes on sales and content now, not builds.
Quick answers
- What did Steven Tann help EweCall with?
- Planning and setting up an AI coworker to automate EweCall's customer onboarding. It builds each AI receptionist from a short form, tests and scores it, and sends the go-live and payment message, so setup takes minutes instead of half a day.
- Can AI build and test another AI agent?
- Yes, with guardrails. Here the coworker writes the agent from a set template and the customer's answers, text-tests it, and holds it back until it scores 88 or more. A human still allocates the phone number.
- How much does it cost to run?
- A couple of dollars in AI credits per agent build, because each task runs on the cheapest model that can do it well.
- Who is this kind of work right for?
- Any service business where onboarding a new customer is the same handful of steps every time. Start with a free call or the AI Ops Audit.
In Russell's words
Having followed Steve's content live on Facebook for a few months, I took the plunge and jumped on his Wednesday night live build (free.) Would highly recommend anyone looking to do more with AI and less day to day admin take the time to get in touch with Steve.
We worked on a separate project around my Voice AI solution and we got the build down from 3-4 hours to under 20 minutes per agent. Steve knows his stuff and is super generous with his time. Can't recommend him highly enough.
Russell Goldthorpe
Founder, EweCall · Google review
Want this in your business?
If you run a service business and you want AI working properly, not just bought, let's talk.