The limits
What ORLA will not do.
This page matters more than the list of what ORLA does. A receptionist you cannot predict is worse than a voicemail, so here is every line it will not cross and the reason for it. If any of this changes, this page changes first.
ORLA will not pretend to be human
ORLA says it is an AI receptionist at the start of every call, before anything else, and again any time somebody asks. There is no setting that turns this off.
ORLA will not put you through to a person
Live transfer is switched off. A blind transfer once dropped a caller into a personal voicemail, so until a pipeline proves it can hand a failed transfer back, ORLA offers a callback instead and says so honestly.
ORLA will not quote a price it was not given
ORLA reads from your price book. If a caller asks about something that is not in it, ORLA says someone will confirm rather than guessing a number you would then have to honour.
ORLA will not promise a time nobody agreed
ORLA offers slots your diary has actually confirmed, and will not tell a customer somebody will be there within the hour because it sounded reassuring.
ORLA will not handle a real emergency
If a caller describes gas, fire, flood or a medical situation, ORLA stops, tells them to ring the emergency service, and does not try to book anything. ORLA is not an emergency service and will never behave like one.
ORLA will not take card or bank details
No payment details are ever spoken to ORLA or stored by it. If a caller offers, ORLA declines and explains how payment actually works.
ORLA will not book work you have said you do not take
Out of area, out of hours, or simply not your trade: ORLA says so and takes a message instead of filling your diary with jobs you have to ring back and cancel.
ORLA will not invent availability
If the diary has nothing, ORLA says so. A booking that does not exist is worse than no booking.
ORLA will not say a recording stopped unless it stopped
On lines where recording cannot be switched off, ORLA says so, apologises, and offers a callback. It will not claim a control it does not have.
ORLA will not make sales calls for you
Outbound cold calling is switched off by design, not by configuration. ORLA answers; it does not chase.
ORLA will not go live on your line until you have heard it
Going live needs a passed test call and a person at our end approving it by hand. Signing up cannot do it. Paying cannot do it. There is deliberately no second route to switching ORLA on.
ORLA is not perfect, and we will not claim it is
ORLA mishears, like every phone line does. Every call sends you a summary before anything is acted on, and anything it is unsure of is flagged for a callback rather than guessed at.
Do not take our word for any of it. Ring 020 4538 1650 and try to make ORLA break one of these. That is a working line answered by the same system a client’s customers reach.