AI receptionist for handyman and home-repair businessesThe handyman answering service that books while you're on a ladder

You can't stop drilling to take a call, so the caller hangs up and tries the next name on the list. Penny answers in one ring, sorts the five-minute fix from the weekend project, and drops a scoped visit on your calendar.

Start free trial
No credit card Live in 10 minutes Cancel anytime
Don’t take our word for it

Call Penny right now.

This is a live line answered by Penny herself — not a recording. Hear how fast she picks up and how she handles a real conversation.

(224) 257-3735
  • Ask Penny to book an appointment and listen to her read the details back before she locks a time.
  • Cut in while she's mid-sentence — she holds the thread and keeps going.
  • Ask her outright whether she's a person — she'll tell you she's an automated assistant.
Phones in handyman

The calls handyman and home-repair businesses actually miss.

Calls land while your hands are full

A drill in one hand and a stud finder in the other means the phone rings out. Every call you can't grab mid-job is a booking that goes to whoever picked up first. Penny takes the overflow so you keep working.

Is it a quick fix or a real project?

“Can you hang a few things?” and “my deck is rotting out” are very different days. Penny asks enough to tell them apart — what, where, how big — so you quote the visit right instead of showing up blind.

The shopping-around caller

Homeowners call three handymen and book the one who answers and sounds organized. Let it ring through and you've handed that punch-list to a competitor. Penny makes sure a live, helpful voice is yours.

Double-bookings and forgotten callbacks

Jotting jobs on a notepad between sites is how Tuesday gets booked twice and a callback never happens. Penny checks your real calendar before she offers a slot and logs every call so nothing slips.

Listen in

A real handyman call, booked end to end.

A multi-item punch-list call, scoped to a half-day visit and booked end to end — no human picked up first, and the confirmation went out by text and email.

pennyassistant.com/calls/live · 00:48
Inbound call · Truett Home Repair
Penny is speaking · transcribing live
Penny
Thanks for calling Truett Home Repair — this is Penny. What can I help you with?
Felix (caller)
Hi, I've got a list of stuff — a sticking door, a leaky faucet, and some shelves I need hung.
Penny
Perfect, that's right in our wheelhouse. So I can scope the visit — is the leaky faucet just dripping, or is there water pooling under the sink?
Felix (caller)
Just a slow drip from the handle, no flooding.
Penny
Good — that's a quick one. Can I get your name and the address for the visit?
Felix (caller)
Felix Aldridge, 14 Sparrow Court.
Penny
Thanks, Felix. With a door, a faucet, and shelf-hanging, that's about a half-day. I've got Wednesday morning or Thursday afternoon open — which suits you?
Felix (caller)
Thursday afternoon works.
Penny
Booked — Thursday afternoon for a door adjustment, faucet repair, and shelf install. I'm texting and emailing you a confirmation now. Anything else on the list?
Felix (caller)
That's it for now, thanks.
Penny
You're all set, Felix — we'll see you Thursday.
Captured automatically
Name
Felix Aldridge
Address
14 Sparrow Court
Work needed
Door adjustment · faucet repair · shelf install
Appointment
Thursday afternoon · ~half-day · confirmed
Synced to Jobber & calendar
Do the math

What does voicemail cost you?

Plug in your own numbers — the defaults are sourced, not invented.

Default job value: $390 Angi — typical cost to hire a handyman (national average) (as of 2026-01-01). Adjust to your numbers.

What voicemail costs you

If you miss 6 calls a week and close 45% of them at $390 a job, voicemail is costing you about

$4,559/month
Penny starts at $29/month — about one booked job pays for a whole year of her answering.
The playbook

How Penny handles Handyman calls.

This is documentation of what she actually does — configured to your services, your calendar, your rules.

What she asks every caller
  • Name, callback number, and the service address
  • The full punch-list — what's broken or needs installing, room by room
  • Rough scope per item so a half-day job doesn't get booked as an hour
  • Whether anything is urgent — active leak, no heat, a security or safety issue
What she books on the spot
  • Quick-fix and punch-list visits into open calendar blocks
  • Half- and full-day project slots for bigger repairs and installs
  • Estimate walk-throughs for remodels and anything you'd rather quote in person
What she hands to a human
  • Active water, gas, or electrical hazards — flagged urgent and handed to you, not booked for next week
  • Jobs outside what you take on (full electrical panels, roofing) — captured and routed, never promised
  • Callers who want to talk to you directly — warm-transferred during work hours, or a detailed message texted over otherwise
After hours

Penny answers 24/7. Evening and weekend callers get the visit booked when your calendar shows an opening, with a text-and-email confirmation; genuine emergencies get flagged and sent to you instead of parked in voicemail.

Works with
Google CalendarJobberSoonHousecall ProSoonQuickBooksSoonZapierSoon

Google Calendar is live today; the rest are on the roadmap. Every lead and booking is emailed to you now.

Beyond answering

One receptionist, every call handled.

Answers every call, 24/7

Penny picks up on the first ring — nights, weekends, lunch breaks, and when you’re already on the other line.

Books jobs to your calendar

She checks real availability, offers slots, and writes the appointment straight into the calendar you already use.

Captures every lead

Name, number, address, and the reason they called — logged and emailed to you the moment they hang up.

Answers the everyday questions

Hours, pricing, service areas, “are you open today?” — Penny answers FAQs and escalates the calls that need you.

Plays nice with your stack

Books into the tools you already run on.

Appointments land in your Google Calendar today — and the CRM and field-service connectors below are on the way, so leads will flow straight into the tools your team already lives in.

GGoogle CalendarJJobberSoonHHouseCall ProSoonSServiceTitanSoonZZapierSoonCCalendlySoonQQuickBooksSoonHHubSpotSoonSSalesforceSoonOOutlookSoonTTwilioSoonSSlackSoon
More CRM, field-service, and messaging connectors — plus 5,000+ apps through Zapier — are on the roadmap.
Handyman questions

What handyman and home-repair businesses ask us.

Still curious? Penny can answer your questions too — give her a call.

That's the point of her triage. She walks the caller's punch-list item by item, asks enough to gauge scope — a dripping faucet versus water under the sink, hanging a shelf versus framing a wall — and books the right amount of time. You show up with the day already sized instead of guessing on arrival.

She's set up on your services, so she speaks in the jobs your callers describe — drywall patches, faucet swaps, door tune-ups, mounting, deck boards, honey-do lists. She won't promise work you don't do or quote a price you haven't set; she scopes it and books the visit so you can quote it on site.

How Penny introduces herself is up to you. What she never does is pretend: if a caller asks whether she's a real person, she says she's an automated assistant — and keeps right on booking the job. A homeowner with a list of repairs cares that someone picked up and got it scheduled.

Yes — Penny is fully bilingual. She auto-detects whether a caller opens in English or Spanish and switches mid-call to match them, so a Spanish-speaking homeowner gets their repair list scoped and booked instead of a callback request.

She gets the caller to a person without dropping the ball. During work hours she can warm-transfer someone who needs you directly; otherwise she takes a detailed message — the address, the work, and any urgency — then texts and emails you the summary so the job never dies on a voicemail you check at 9 PM.

Penny starts at $29/month with 60 minutes of call time included, and plans scale to 625 minutes. Traditional human answering services bill per minute per agent — see our answering service cost guide for the side-by-side math.

More trades

Penny works where the phone rings.

Stop sending customers to voicemail.

Give Penny your number and let her answer the next call. You’ll have her booking jobs before your coffee’s cold.

Start free trial
No credit card Live in 10 minutes Cancel anytime