“Who would be moving in?” is what Penny’s senior living answering service asks a family calling about a tour.

A fall with an injury, stroke or cardiac signs, or a resident with memory loss who has left the building gets the 911 instruction before anything else. She asks nothing about symptoms and gives no first aid. The urgent alert she emails you carries the number the call came from and a link to the conversation, and whatever the caller tells her, such as their name and where the person is, follows in the summary email after the call. If you set the rule to transfer, she connects your on-duty staff after the 911 line. See Emergency Rules for the full workflow.

Tours are booked into the Google Calendar or Outlook calendar your move-in coordinator already keeps, with the caller’s name and number in the event notes and any form answers you choose to show there, such as the reason for calling. A call record can also go out through Zapier or a signed webhook to the CRM your sales team works prospects in, and Zapier can post a message to a Slack or Teams channel your managers read.

Penny starts at $29 a month on Starter with annual billing, and Pro at $99 adds the on-call schedule, so an evening transfer goes to whichever manager is on duty that night. Paid plans include monthly minutes; when you choose to keep answering past them, 60 more minutes are added at a time at the plan’s rate. The answering service cost guide compares plans, included minutes, and usage charges.

She follows your house rules on it. Add one such as “Never confirm or deny whether someone lives here, whoever asks; offer to take a message for the team,” and she follows it on every call, so an adult child, a spouse, a power of attorney, a police officer and the person who pays the bill all hear the same answer. She writes down the relationship as the caller gave it, and your staff decide what your privacy policy allows.

She explains in general terms how communities charge. Most charge a monthly fee, a life plan community usually charges an entrance fee plus monthly fees, and some price help with daily activities separately after their own assessment. If you list your rates under your services, she gives them only as you wrote them and never works one out. She quotes no figure that isn’t in your services, your FAQs or your website, and anything else goes into the message for your team.

No. She can explain what each level of living generally is, and she records what the caller describes in their words. Whether someone fits assisted living, memory care or another setting is your team’s call, usually after your own assessment, so she books the tour or takes the details for them and never predicts the outcome.

She takes the planner’s name, callback number and the discharge date, and what they are asking for. She does not ask for a diagnosis. A discharge today or tomorrow is one of the urgent rules, so the call is emailed to you as urgent. She tells the planner she can’t confirm a move-in or a return herself, and she promises no bed, admission or level of care.

She recognizes the request and writes it down in the caller’s words for your team. She does not say whether the community can or can’t provide it, and she does not suggest another provider. Your team calls back with what is possible.

She keeps every reply to one or two short sentences. A resident with memory loss who says they are outside the community alone fits the missing-resident rule, so she gives its 911 instruction first and emails you an urgent alert, and she connects your on-duty staff if you set the rule to transfer. A resident waiting for a ride home or wanting to go home reaches you in the summary email, in their own words. She never promises a ride or a pickup.

She can say these programs exist, that the program or the insurer decides who qualifies, and that Medicare doesn’t pay for long-term custodial care such as assisted living. She never tells a caller whether they would be eligible, and she takes the question about which payment sources your community works with for your move-in coordinator.

They can leave a message for your staff, and she writes it down in their words with the name and apartment they give. Your staff decide whether it is passed on. She puts no call through to a resident’s apartment, because a transfer reaches only the staff number you set.