How do I check out an AI receptionist company before I sign up?

Test it yourself, ask for proof, and find out exactly who you’re paying. Call the company’s demo line the way a difficult customer would. Ask for the evidence behind every number in the pitch. Be wary of any promise about how much money you’ll make or “recover.” Look up the legal company behind the brand name and read its complaints. Then insist on a written plan that says exactly what the receptionist will do on your phone. In fairness: this site is published by SANO Systems, which sells this kind of service — so hold us to every check on this page too.

Call the demo yourself, and make it hard

Don’t judge it by a recording the salesperson plays you. Call it. Ask something off the script, interrupt it, change your mind halfway through a booking, ask for a person, say you’re unhappy about a past visit. If your customers speak Spanish, call in Spanish. Then listen for three things. Does it say it’s an AI up front? When it doesn’t know something, does it say so — or make something up? How quickly does it get you to a human? If a company won’t let you call a live demo, that’s an answer in itself.

Ask for the proof behind the claims

Any number in a pitch — calls answered, bookings made, money “recovered” — deserves a follow-up: which businesses, over what period, measured how? There’s a recent example of why. On March 24, 2026, the FTC settled its case against Air AI, a company that sold conversational AI voice agents. The FTC alleged the company falsely told buyers they would make “substantial earnings” and were protected by a “refund or buy-back guarantee.” The order included an eighteen million dollar judgment, largely suspended, fifty thousand dollars in consumer relief, and a ban on selling business opportunities and on making earnings claims without substantiation.

That case binds that company; it isn’t a verdict on the whole industry, and this isn’t legal advice. But the lesson travels: an earnings promise is a claim the seller should be able to back up, and a guarantee is only as good as its written terms. If a vendor can’t show you where a number came from, treat it as marketing.

Check the company, then get it in writing

• Find the legal entity. What company name is on the contract and the invoice, and where is it registered? A brand with no identifiable company behind it is a problem.
• Read the complaints. Search the company’s legal name with “complaints” and “reviews,” and check the Better Business Bureau. Look for patterns — billing surprises, renewals, trouble canceling, trouble keeping a phone number.
• Ask for references from businesses like yours, and actually call them.
• Get a written plan. It should say which calls it answers and when, its first sentence (including that it’s an AI), what it books and into which calendar, what it always hands to a person, how you get summaries, who fixes wrong answers and how fast, and what you take with you if you leave. Before you sign, run the paperwork through our contract checklist.

One more honest check: you may not need a new company at all. Some booking apps already answer texts or calls, so first find out whether your booking software already answers the phone.