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Guide

What is an AI front office?

It answers the calls your practice can't get to and books the appointment. Once texting is live, a lead that goes quiet gets a second outreach. Here's what that means in practice, and what it deliberately isn't.

See it answer a call →How it works
The short version

What it does

  1. 01Answers inbound calls after hours, during overflow, or on every call depending on the plan
  2. 02Books appointments on the calendar Velaire keeps for the practice, after checking live availability
  3. 03Follows up when a call doesn't end in a booking, once texting is live

It never gives medical advice or triages a symptom.

The short version

Front-desk phone work, running when nobody can pick up

An AI front office covers the administrative half of a front desk: the phone, the booking, and the chasing. It does not touch the clinical half.

What it does

  • Answers inbound calls after hours, during overflow, or on every call depending on the plan
  • Books appointments on the calendar Velaire keeps for the practice, after checking live availability
  • Follows up when a call doesn't end in a booking, once texting is live
  • Keeps every call, lead, and booking request in one dashboard with a monthly report

What it does not do

  • Give medical advice, triage a symptom, or make any clinical judgement
  • Replace the front desk. It covers the calls the team physically can't reach
  • Require a new phone number, a port, or any new hardware
  • Decide on its own what to do with a call it isn't configured for. Those route to a live line or take a message
Compared with

How it differs from what you already have

Most practices already run one of these. The difference is where the call ends up.

Voicemail

Records a message and waits. Someone still has to listen to it, call back, and hope the patient picks up.

Answers the call, books the appointment during the conversation, and confirms the time before the caller hangs up.

An answering service

A person takes a message on your behalf. Your team still does the booking, usually the next morning.

The appointment is booked on the calendar Velaire keeps for the practice, without a second round of phone tag.

A phone tree

Routes by keypad. It cannot answer a question a caller asks in their own words, and long menus are where people hang up.

A natural conversation. The caller says what they need and gets an answer, not a menu.

Hiring another receptionist

Covers the hours that person works. Evenings, weekends, and the overflow during a busy stretch stay uncovered.

Covers exactly the calls your team can't get to, without changing your headcount or your existing number.

Working out whether the trade makes sense for your own call volume? Run your own numbers →

From first conversation to first call

A considered setup. A simpler start.

Most practices are ready within 48 hours of signing. Your configuration and approval come first.

  1. Share how you work

    Your hours, service menu, common questions, and routing rules.

  2. Listen, review, approve

    We configure your agent. You hear it and approve before it goes live.

  3. Go live on your number

    Your existing line, with calls and requests ready for your team.

Choosing one

What to actually check before you sign

The category is crowded and most vendors sound identical on a homepage.

We wrote up the questions worth asking, including the ones that separate a real deployment from a demo: what happens on a call it cannot handle, whether it books or just takes a message, and which vendors in the chain can reach patient data, and where they process it.

Read the vendor checklist
Good questions. Clear answers.

Common questions

What is an AI front office?
An AI front office is software that handles the front-desk phone work a practice can't get to: answering inbound calls, booking the appointment on the calendar it keeps for the practice, and following up once texting is live when a call doesn't end in a booking. It covers administrative work only, not clinical decisions.
How is an AI front office different from an AI receptionist?
They usually describe the same thing. "AI receptionist" emphasises answering the phone; "AI front office" covers the work that follows the call as well, including booking capture, follow-up, and reporting.
Does an AI front office replace front-desk staff?
No. It covers the calls a team physically can't answer, such as after-hours calls and overflow during a busy stretch. The people who know your patients stay where they are.
Is an AI front office Privacy Act compliant?
That depends on the vendor's infrastructure, not on the category. There is no Australian equivalent of a BAA, so a US one confers nothing: ask instead for an APP-aligned data-handling schedule in the contract, the subprocessor list, and whether any data leaves Australia, which is an APP 8 matter that leaves liability with your practice.
Do patients have to talk to a menu?
No. An AI front office is a natural conversation rather than a keypad menu. The caller says what they need in their own words.
How long does an AI front office take to set up?
It varies by vendor. Velaire configures the agent to a practice's own service menu and booking process, and most practices are live within 48 hours of signing.
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