See what unanswered phone calls cost your business every month — and the ROI of an AI receptionist that answers them 24/7. Free, no sign-up.
When a first-time caller reaches voicemail, most of them hang up and dial the next business on the list. Widely cited phone-behavior surveys put the share of callers who refuse to leave a voicemail at around 80%, and callback rates on the messages that do get left are low. For an appointment-based or trade business, that makes every unanswered new-customer call a near-direct revenue loss — not a call you will simply catch later.
This calculator turns that into a monthly and annual figure using four inputs you can estimate in a minute, then compares it against the price of an AI receptionist that answers every call.
Method: deterministic arithmetic on your inputs · No AI, no arbitrary estimate
| Constant | Value | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| Weeks per month | 4.33 | 52 weeks ÷ 12 months |
| Answer-recovery rate | 90% | Share of currently-missed calls an always-on AI receptionist answers and holds; 10% allowance for hang-ups on any non-human greeting and misdials |
| Months per year | 12 | Annualisation |
The calculator assumes the AI recovers 90% of missed calls at your stated booking rate. If you route urgent calls to a live person as well, treat the output as a floor.
This calculator tells you whether an AI receptionist pays for itself. It doesn't tell you which one to pick — and that choice matters, because entry plans differ a lot on the things that actually convert a call: warm transfer to a human, real calendar booking, CRM write-back, bilingual handling, and after-hours routing.
For side-by-side vendor pricing, capabilities, and independent third-party latency benchmarks, use voiceagentcompare.com:
A plumbing business misses 15 calls a week. A new job is worth $400 on average, and about 50% of answered new-customer calls book. At a $60/month AI plan:
| Step | Result |
|---|---|
| Missed calls / month (15 × 4.33) | 65 |
| Recovered calls (65 × 0.90) | 58.5 |
| Recovered bookings (58.5 × 0.50) | 29.2 |
| Recovered revenue / month (29.2 × $400) | $11,700 |
| Net monthly gain ($11,700 − $60) | $11,640 |
| ROI on the AI plan | 195× |
The margin narrows fast for low-value transactions or very low call volume — which is exactly the case the calculator is there to catch before you commit.
Multiply missed calls per week by 4.33 to get a monthly figure, multiply that by the share of new-customer calls that would have booked, then multiply by the average value of a new customer. That gives lost revenue per month. Multiply by 12 for the annual figure.
Industry surveys commonly report that roughly 80% of callers who reach voicemail hang up without leaving a message, and most of those never call back. That is why a missed call is usually a lost customer, not a delayed one.
Entry AI receptionist plans generally start around $20 to $60 per month for low call volume, with mid-tier plans in the $100 to $300 range once you add warm call transfers, calendar booking, and CRM sync. Usage-based platforms charge roughly $0.10 to $0.16 per minute instead of a flat fee. The cost breakdown on voiceagentcompare.com has the current per-vendor figures.
It assumes an AI receptionist answers and holds 90% of the calls you currently miss. The remaining 10% covers callers who hang up on any non-human greeting or misdial. You can treat the output as conservative if your AI setup routes urgent calls to a live person.
It depends on your call volume and average customer value. If you miss even a handful of new-customer calls a week and each customer is worth a few hundred dollars, the recovered revenue usually exceeds the monthly cost several times over. Low-volume businesses with cheap transactions see a smaller margin.
Indirectly. Enter every call you currently miss, including nights and weekends. An AI receptionist answers 24/7, so after-hours calls are part of what it recovers.
No. It is a deterministic estimate based on the numbers you enter. Real results depend on your close rate on answered calls, how well the AI is configured for your business, and seasonality. Use it as a starting point for a build-versus-buy decision, not a guarantee.