The formula
A missed call only costs you money when three things are all true: the caller wanted to buy (not a wrong number, not a supplier), they bought from someone else or gave up, and you had room for them — a free table, an open slot, a van on the road.
So the number is: missed calls × the share who were buyers × the share of those who went elsewhere × your average ticket.
Nobody knows those two shares exactly, and that is fine. Run it twice, once pessimistic and once optimistic, and see whether the low end still bothers you. The examples below are illustrations, not data — swap in your own.
A restaurant on a Friday night
The host stand is slammed between 6 and 9pm and 4 calls go unanswered.
- Buyers: dinner-rush callers are mostly trying to book. Say 75% — 3 of the 4.
- Went elsewhere: somebody calling at 7 wants a table at 7:30, so they try the next place on the map. Say 60% — about 2 tables.
- Average ticket: say $90 a party. That Friday cost roughly $160, and a month of Fridays roughly $640 — before a single Saturday.
A two-chair salon
Both stylists are with clients when the phone rings, 8 times over a week.
- Buyers: say 60% — about 5 of them wanted an appointment.
- Went elsewhere: hair is stickier than dinner and people do call back, but “I’ll try later” has a way of becoming next month. Say 40% — about 2 appointments.
- Average ticket: a cut and colour at $120. Roughly $230 a week.
A locksmith at 2am
One call while you are asleep. Nobody rings a locksmith at 2am to chat, and somebody locked out does not leave a voicemail and wait for morning — they call the next listing. Both shares are close to 100%, so at a $150 job that single call is $150. The arithmetic is short because the intent is absolute.
The calls you never see
The worksheet starts from the calls you know you missed, and that count is usually too low. A caller who hits a busy line while you are on another call often leaves no trace at all, depending on how your phone is set up — so whatever number you got is likely on the conservative side.
This is also why “just hire someone to answer” is harder than it sounds. A person covers one line, during their hours, in the languages they happen to speak. The calls that cost the most — Friday at 8pm, 2am, somebody’s mother asking in Mandarin — are the ones a single person does not cover.
What the fix costs
This is where we stop being neutral. Our AI receptionist starts at $199 a month with 400 minutes of talk time included and no per-booking fee. Put your own worksheet number next to that.
We are not going to tell you how quickly it pays for itself. We do not yet have enough customers to give an honest average, and an invented one would just be another round, scary number. Your worksheet is a better answer than ours would be.
Do not take the worksheet’s word for it either: call one of the demo businesses and book something, or play all 17 recorded calls and find the one closest to your trade.