The first week on Giday: what to check on day one, day three, day seven

Your card goes on file at signup and nothing is charged. The week doesn't start at signup either: it starts the moment your receptionist answers its first real call. So you can set up on a Sunday night, test-chat it in the dashboard, and start the clock on Monday morning when you divert.

Two things to do before you divert:

1. Ring the receptionist's own number from your mobile. Hear your greeting, ask it a question a customer would ask, ask it whether it's a person. That's what your callers will get.
2. Read the business knowledge you gave it. It only knows what you told it. If a caller asks about something that isn't there, it takes a message rather than guessing, which is right, but a thin list means more messages and fewer bookings.

Divert, then let it answer. Resist the urge to ring it every ten minutes; those minutes come off your sixty.

At the end of the day, open the dashboard and read the transcripts. You're looking for three things: did it understand what callers wanted, did it offer the right slots, and did anything come through as a message that should have been a booking. The last one usually means a service or a price is missing from your knowledge. Add it.

Check your phone too: every booking and message arrives as a text, so you'll know by evening how the day went without opening anything.

By now you have a feel for it. Day three is the day to adjust:

• Hours wrong? Fix them on the settings page; the next call uses the new ones.
• Greeting feels off? Pick another preset or write your own. The recording notice stays.
• A caller got a message when you wanted a booking? Add the service, with a duration.
• Too many urgent calls reaching your phone? Change the urgent-calls number or leave it blank.
• Not enough reaching you? The reverse.

If you're on a plan that quotes, day three is also when you'll know whether your price list is complete enough. The gaps show up as messages. The price-list guide covers what to add.

Three days before the week ends you get an email with what you actually used, the plan we'd recommend from that, and two links: keep it, or cancel. Nothing is charged by that email. It's information.

If you click keep, you pick a plan and the subscription starts. If you do nothing, the week simply ends: the receptionist stops answering, nothing is charged, and we hold your number for 30 days in case you change your mind. If you cancel, same thing, sooner.

There's no retention call, no "let me get my manager", and the divert comes off with one code.

Not "is it clever". Count the bookings and messages in the dashboard that arrived while you couldn't have answered, and ask what those were worth. That's the whole decision, and it's yours from your own numbers, not ours. The plans are on the pricing page; the settings are explained in the three rules to set.