How Attendra handles your calls

This page describes, in plain words, what the Attendra assistant does when it answers your clinic's phone. It is written from the code that runs on every call, and it changes only when that code changes. We would rather you read it before you sign up than be surprised later.

The assistant has two parts. A voice model listens and speaks. Everything that decides something (who the caller is, which times exist, whether a booking is saved, what counts as an emergency) is decided by Attendra's own code under your clinic's settings. The voice model cannot talk its way past those rules, and the rules are public and tested.

1. Every call starts the same way

• The assistant greets the caller with your clinic's greeting, which must say that they are speaking with an AI assistant. Attendra refuses a greeting that does not.
• It speaks English and Spanish, as your clinic chooses, and follows the language the caller uses.
• If you turn call recording on, a notice plays before anything is recorded. Recording is off unless you turn it on.
• A caller on your VIP list is told they are being connected, and goes straight to your front desk.

2. Who is calling

• Before it books, changes or reads anything about a pet, the assistant checks who is calling: the owner's full name, the pet's name and the phone number on file. The number the call comes from is only a hint, because families share phones.
• A wrong detail and an unknown name get the same answer, so nobody can find out from the assistant whether someone is your client.
• After 3 failed tries, it stops checking and offers a call back from your team. The call is flagged for you to review.
• If two records match the same details, it never picks one. It passes the call to your team.
• A new client is added only after the check finds nobody. At most 3 new records can be added on one call, and at most 5 from one phone number in a day.

3. Booking a visit

• The assistant only offers times your schedule actually has free. It cannot invent a time, and each booking is checked again before it is saved.
• It reads the booking back (the pet, the visit, the vet, the day and time) and saves it only on a clear yes. "Maybe", "actually" or a question is not a yes.
• It books at least 2 hours ahead, or more if you set a notice period for a visit type, and never further ahead than you allow. The gaps you set between visits are kept.
• When the caller has no vet in mind, it follows the booking rules you choose in Settings: the pet's usual vet first if they are free within the days you set (3 by default), otherwise the earliest time with any vet. When several vets are free at once, the vet with the fewest visits that day gets the booking, or your own order. Only vets who see that kind of animal are offered.
• It offers 3 different times, never the same time 3 times.
• Asked "which vet is best?", it does not rank or compare your vets. It explains that it will find a suitable time and follows your rules.

4. Changing or cancelling

Moves and cancellations work the same way as bookings: the caller is checked, the change is read back, and nothing is changed without a clear yes. Your team can still squeeze someone in outside your hours from the dashboard; the assistant never does.

5. Requests for your team

• Refill requests, records requests and call-back requests go to your Requests queue for a person to decide. The assistant never approves a medication and never reads records out over the phone.
• A refill marked ready or declined needs a team member you allow to approve refills.
• A call that ends with the caller's request unfinished becomes a request automatically, so somebody gets back to them.

6. What it never does

• It never gives medical advice about an animal or a person, never interprets symptoms and never suggests a dose. Those questions become a call back from your team.
• It never makes up a fact, a price, a name or a time. It answers only from your settings and the documents you add.
• It never ranks or criticises your vets.
• It never argues with a caller and never swears.

7. Emergencies

• Every caller's words are checked for emergency language, in English and Spanish, before the assistant answers. This check is in code and no setting turns it off.
• For an animal in danger (poisoning, trouble breathing, a collapse, bleeding, bloat and the other signs on our public list), the assistant gives the emergency hospital you listed that is open right now, and can text its address.
• A person who may harm themselves always hears the crisis line first.
• If you set an on-call number, serious emergencies are transferred to it.
• Nothing cuts an emergency short: not a booking in progress, not a difficult caller.

8. When you are closed

You choose: the assistant books as usual, or it takes requests for your team to handle in the morning and books nothing. Emergencies are handled the same way at any hour.

9. Texts

• The assistant texts booking confirmations, and, if the caller agrees, things they just heard: directions, your hours, the emergency hospital or a link you set.
• At most 3 texts on one call, and at most 8 to one number in a day. A caller who replies STOP gets no more texts.
• Appointment reminders are off until you turn them on, go only to clients who agreed, and are never sent in the quiet hours you set (8 pm to 8 am by default).
• Test calls from your dashboard never send a real text.

10. When a call goes wrong

• Silence. If the caller has finished speaking and nothing comes back for 6 seconds, the assistant is told to answer, and at 14 seconds to apologise for the wait.
• Misheard details. The assistant does not ask for the same detail a third time. If a detail given twice still does not work, it apologises and offers a call back with what it has.
• An upset caller. A caller who is frustrated, or swears out of frustration, is helped like anyone else, offered a call back, and never hung up on.
• A transfer that fails. The caller stays with the assistant, is offered a call back, and your team is told.

11. Insulting or threatening callers

Insults or threats aimed at the assistant are treated differently from frustration:

1. The first time, the assistant stays calm and polite and keeps helping.
2. The second time, it says once that it will need to end the call if the language continues, and offers a call back from the clinic.
3. The third time, it ends the call politely and tells the caller they are welcome to call back.

It never ends a call this way during an emergency. The call shows "Abusive caller" in your dashboard and is always flagged for your review.

12. Ending a call

• Before it ends a call, the assistant asks whether there is anything else, and ends it only when the caller says no or says goodbye.
• A goodbye is never cut off. If the assistant has said goodbye and the line stays quiet for 6 seconds, the call is hung up.
• It never ends a call on a caller whose request is unfinished, except as described in section 11.

13. Your team stays in charge

• Your team can follow any call live with captions, send the assistant a note, take the call over, or end it.
• Every call has a transcript, a short summary, and the steps the assistant took. Calls that need a look (an emergency, a caller who could not be checked, an unfinished request, an abusive caller) are flagged on your Today page.
• Everything the assistant and your team do is written to an audit log.

14. What is kept

Transcripts and call details are kept for the period you set (about 7 years by default, at least 30 days). Names, dates of birth and phone numbers are encrypted before they are stored. Our privacy policy has the details, including who processes calls for us.

15. What you can change

In Settings you control the greeting and voice, languages, opening hours and special days, vets and the animals they see, visit types with their notice and gaps, booking rules, emergency hospitals and the on-call number, transfers and VIP callers, what happens when you are closed, texts and reminders, common questions, and the documents the assistant answers from.

The safety rules on this page (identity checks, the clear yes, emergencies, no medical advice) are the same for every clinic and cannot be turned off. If you need something else, or want a rule to work differently, write to us. We read every request, and when we change how calls are handled, this page changes with it.