What Does an AI Receptionist Cost Per Month?

AI receptionist cost per month lands anywhere from under $100 to $500 or more, and the spread has less to do with quality than with the billing model. Per-minute and per-call plans start low and climb with volume. Flat plans cost more on paper and stay put. Here's how to read the numbers before you sign anything.

The monthly ranges you'll actually see

Across the market, advertised AI receptionist plans commonly fall into three buckets:

• Low-entry metered plans. Often $50–$150 a month at low volume. The catch: the meter runs on every call, so your bill tracks your busiest weeks — which are exactly the weeks you bought coverage for.
• Mid-range bundled plans. Roughly $150–$300 a month with a block of minutes or calls included, then overage charges past the cap.
• Flat unlimited plans. A set monthly price with no meter running. Ava is in this bucket: $97 first month, then $297/month flat, unlimited calls, no contract, cancel anytime.

A reasonable planning figure for a garage door shop comparing options is $100–$400 a month depending on model and volume. But the range matters less than what the number actually includes.

What moves AI receptionist cost per month up or down

Five things move the monthly number more than anything else:

1. Billing model. Per-minute bills drift with call length. Per-call bills drift with volume. Flat bills don't drift at all.
2. Call volume. A shop pushing 200 calls a month through a metered plan pays a very different number than the sales-page quote that assumed 60.
3. After-hours coverage. Some plans charge premiums for nights, weekends, and holidays — the hours where garage door emergencies actually happen.
4. What's included. Booking into your schedule, emergency triage, and instant call summaries are core features on some plans and paid add-ons on others. The line items worth checking are laid out in what an AI receptionist subscription should include.
5. Onboarding charges. A cheap monthly number paired with a fat setup fee is a different deal than it looks. More on that in AI receptionist setup fees: what to watch for.

For the full breakdown of pricing across every model, see the parent guide: AI receptionist cost: what you'll actually pay.

Run the monthly cost against one captured job

Don't compare monthly prices to each other. Compare them to your average ticket.

Say your average repair ticket is $350 and a flat plan costs $297 a month. The plan pays for itself if it captures one job a month you'd otherwise have missed — one broken-spring call at 7 AM that would have gone to a competitor while you were under a door. Every captured job after that first one is margin.

Now run the same check on a metered plan at $120 a month. Cheaper, until a storm week doubles your call volume and your invoice doubles with it — and you still need to confirm the plan books jobs into your schedule instead of just taking messages.

This is why contractors who've run these numbers tend to care less about the monthly figure and more about cost per captured job. The monthly cost is the denominator. The captured work is the numerator. If the numerator is zero because calls get messages instead of bookings, any monthly number is too high.

What this means for your shop

AI receptionist cost per month is a real number you can budget, but only after you know three things: the billing model, the volume assumptions behind the quote, and what's included at that price. Get the rate card from any provider you're considering. Ask what the bill looks like in your busiest month, not your average one. Then compare that total against the revenue from one or two captured jobs at your average ticket. For most shops with real call volume, the math isn't close — the expensive option is the month of calls nobody answered.

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