Answer calls after hours with a voice agent that knows when you open

After hours is when your business is closed and the phone keeps ringing. At night, on your day off, on a bank holiday or while you're away. Usually voicemail picks up, or nobody does.

With Lera, your voice agent answers, just as it would at midday. Your opening hours don't switch it off or change what it can do. They give it one more piece of information, whether you're open right now and when you open next, so it can say so properly.

Picture a restaurant that closes on Mondays. Someone calls on Monday at nine in the evening and asks if you're open. The agent tells them you're closed today and open tomorrow at one, then asks if there's anything it can help with. If they want a table for Friday and your agent takes bookings, it handles it exactly as it would at lunchtime.

You stop losing the calls that come in while you're closed. People who ring in the evening usually want to book, ask something or place an order, and if nobody answers they call somewhere else.

The agent doesn't have to guess. If you write your hours into its instructions, it has to work it out itself, and close to closing time it can get it wrong. With the hours set in the right place, Lera works it out at the start of each call and the agent receives the answer ready-made.

And it says it naturally, like "we're closed today, we open tomorrow at one" or "today we're open from one to four and from eight to half past eleven".

Open your agent in Agents and go to the Business hours section. Turn on "Set opening hours".

Enter the hours for each day. If you open for lunch and dinner, use "Add a slot" to have two slots on the same day, for example 13:00 to 16:00 and 20:00 to 23:30. Leave the days you don't open as Closed, and use "Copy to the other days" so you don't have to type it seven times.

Check the time zone. It's your business's own, and if you leave it empty the workspace one is used.

Add your special days. Bank holidays, long weekends and time off all work the same way, one day or several in a row with a reason, like "August holidays" from 3 to 24 August. With no hours, those days are closed. With hours, they replace your normal ones, for example Christmas Eve mornings only.

Above the hours you'll see whether you're open or closed right now and when you open next. It's the same calculation the agent will make on the call, so it's a handy way to check you've set things up correctly.

Use it in your instructions. On every call, Lera fills in three variables by itself, which are named slots replaced by their value. {{negocio_abierto}} is "si" (yes) or "no", {{proxima_apertura}} says when you open next and {{horario_hoy}} holds today's hours. You could write, for example, "Is the restaurant open right now? {{negocio_abierto}}. If it isn't, say so, tell them we open {{proxima_apertura}} and offer to help anyway". In a flow agent you can also use them in the condition on an exit.

Save and publish the agent.

Opening hours don't switch the agent off. It answers and helps in the same way at any time of day, open or closed.

If someone asks to speak to a person while you're closed, by default the agent tries anyway, because plenty of people pick up even after closing. If nobody answers, the agent tells the caller when you open instead of being left with nothing to say.

If you'd rather it didn't pass calls through after hours, open the Transfer call tool under Tools and tick "Don’t transfer outside business hours". While you're closed it won't dial your number, it says when you open and keeps helping. The box only appears once the agent has opening hours.

The calculation is made once, at the start of the call. If someone rings at twenty-five past eleven and talks for ten minutes, the agent won't change its mind halfway through.

Holidays don't come preloaded. Add your local and regional ones, which are the ones that really close businesses.

A slot can run past midnight, for example 20:00 to 02:00, and at half past twelve you still count as open.

The three variables only exist if you've set opening hours. Without them, the agent still answers, but it doesn't know whether you're open.

Do I have to switch anything on or off at night? No. The agent always answers. You give it your hours and your special days, and on every call it knows whether you're open and when you open next.

Can I stop it passing calls to me at night? Yes. In the Transfer call tool, tick "Don’t transfer outside business hours". By default it tries anyway, because plenty of people pick up even when they're closed.

Does it work with split shifts? Yes. Each day can have several slots, for example one to four and eight to half past eleven.

What about a day when I only open in the morning? Add it as a special day with its hours. With hours it replaces your normal schedule, and with no hours the day is closed.

Can the agent answer only when I'm closed? If your phone system can forward calls outside business hours, you can send just those calls to your inbound line. If not, forwarding when you don't answer does almost the same job, because when you're closed nobody picks up and the agent takes the call.

How much does it cost to try? €20 free credit, no card needed. Set your hours, call on a day you're closed and hear what it says.