Small business replacing a phone answering service with an AI employee
The AI agent answers every call, handles common questions, and routes to a human when needed. No missed calls.
Make and Receive Phone Calls
Your employee makes and receives phone calls, handling voice conversations just like a human colleague.
Some work happens over the phone. Your employee handles that too. It makes outbound calls for sales outreach, appointment confirmations, and follow-ups. It receives inbound calls for customer support, scheduling, and intake.
Voice conversations are transcribed in real time and logged in the activity feed alongside chat and email interactions. Your employee uses the same memory, skills, and context on a phone call that it uses in chat.
Telephony integrates with your existing phone systems and supports call routing, voicemail, and call transfers. Your employee picks up the phone so your human team does not have to.
AI Agents That Make and Receive Phone Calls
Sistava telephony gives your AI employee a real phone number it can use to make outbound calls and receive inbound ones. Every call is handled by the same agent you configure in the platform, with all the same skills, memory, and integrations available.
This is purpose-built for workflows that still happen over the phone: customer support, appointment scheduling, outbound follow-ups, lead qualification, and anything else where voice is the preferred or required channel.
Transcribed, Logged, and Searchable
Every phone call is transcribed in real time using high-accuracy speech recognition tuned for business conversations. Transcripts are saved to the conversation history alongside any tool calls the agent made during the call.
This means phone conversations become part of the same searchable, auditable record as everything else your AI employee does. You can review any call, understand what was said, and see exactly what actions the agent took as a result.
Full Agent Capabilities Over the Phone
Telephony in Sistava is not a scripted IVR tree. Your AI employee handles phone calls with the same natural conversational ability it uses in chat and voice, plus access to all its connected tools and apps.
If a customer calls to ask about their order, the agent can look it up in your system, update a record, and send a confirmation email, all within the same phone call. The phone is just another interface to a fully capable AI employee.
Use Cases
Support team scaling phone coverage without hiring more agents
An AI employee handles incoming calls at any volume. Peak periods no longer require extra staff.
Sales team using an AI agent for outbound calling campaigns
The AI employee dials, qualifies, and logs the outcome. Your sales team focuses on the warm leads.
Operations team automating appointment reminders via phone
The AI agent calls contacts, delivers the message, and records the response. No manual dialing required.
Comparison
| Before | After |
|---|---|
| Phone calls require a human available every time one comes in. | An AI employee answers and handles calls 24/7 with no staffing gaps. |
| Scaling call capacity means hiring and training more people. | The AI agent handles unlimited concurrent calls without adding headcount. |
| Outbound calling is manual, slow, and inconsistent. | The AI employee runs outbound campaigns automatically and logs every result. |
| Missed calls mean missed opportunities. | Every call gets answered, every time. |
FAQ
Can my AI employee make outbound phone calls?
Yes. You can trigger outbound calls directly from a workflow or have the agent initiate calls as part of a task, such as following up with a lead or confirming an appointment.
What happens when someone calls my AI employee's number?
The AI agent answers and handles the call using natural speech. It can answer questions, take information, look things up using its connected tools, and escalate to a human if needed, based on the instructions you have given it.
Are phone calls recorded?
Calls are transcribed and the transcript is stored, giving you a full record of the conversation. Recording policies depend on your configuration and applicable local regulations. You control whether audio recordings are stored.
Can the AI agent use its tools during a phone call?
Yes. While on a call, the agent has full access to its tools and integrations. It can query databases, update CRM records, check calendars, and take other actions in real time while the conversation continues.
Can my AI agent make and receive phone calls on behalf of my business?
Yes. Telephony support enables both inbound and outbound phone calls, so your AI employee can handle customer calls, book appointments, or follow up on leads. No separate call center software is needed.
We gave our support agent a phone number for after-hours coverage. It answers, resolves about 60 percent of calls without escalation, and leaves me a summary of the rest. My support costs dropped significantly.