AI Receptionist for Interior Designers
Never Miss a Project Enquiry

In a solo or boutique studio the lead designer is out on site all day, so a first-time enquiry hits voicemail and the caller rings the next studio on Houzz. DeskCaller's AI answers on the first ring, qualifies the scope, budget and timescale, and books that enquiry straight into your calendar. From single rooms and e-design to full-service and commercial projects. Live the same day.

24/7
Enquiries answered
First ring
Every project call picked up
Every call
Scope, budget and timescale captured

Why Interior Designers Lose Projects

Every enquiry that hits voicemail is a design project going to the studio that answered first and sounded organised.

You Can't Answer From a Site Visit or Showroom Appointment

You're pinning fabric samples for a living-room scheme or walking a client round a showroom when the phone rings with a whole-home enquiry. You can't break away. By the time you ring back the caller has already spoken to two other studios and booked a consultation elsewhere. Design clients ring several practices and go with whoever picks up and sounds organised.

Enquiries Arrive Without Scope, Budget or Timescale

A voicemail says 'I'd like some help with my house' and nothing else. You spend the first half of every consultation drawing out the basics: how many rooms, renovation or new-build, the furnishings budget, when they need to move in. Without that captured up front you can't tell an e-design enquiry from a £40,000 full-service project, and you plan your week blind.

After-Hours and Trade Calls Go to Voicemail

Homeowners browse portfolios in the evening once the children are asleep, ready to commit to a project. Suppliers, joiners and showrooms ring during the day about live schemes. Both hit voicemail while you're with a client, so serious enquiries cool off and trade coordination stalls until you can call everyone back.

Built for Interior Design Studios
From First Enquiry to Booked Consultation

DeskCaller understands e-design, full-service residential and commercial projects. It qualifies scope and budget, captures colour and material preferences, and routes by project size with the composure of your best studio manager.

Budget and Scope Qualification

Ask the furnishings and design-fee budget up front and route accordingly. Smaller single-room briefs go to e-design or a virtual consultation, full-house and renovation projects go to a discovery call, larger commercial fit-outs go straight to the principal designer.

Project Brief Intake

Capture property type, rooms involved, whether it's a renovation or new-build, approximate floor area in square metres, and the desired move-in or completion date. You arrive at the consultation with the brief already sketched out.

Consultation and Site-Visit Booking

Offer real availability and book the initial consultation or site visit straight into your calendar. Confirmation and reminder texts go out automatically, so fewer appointments slip and your diary stays organised.

24/7 Enquiry Answering

Answer homeowners researching studios in the evenings and at weekends with a warm, on-brand greeting. Never lose a project to voicemail because you were on a site visit or the enquiry came in after six.

Style and Scheme Preferences

Record the look a client is after, whether classic, contemporary, coastal or something eclectic, along with colour and material leanings, Pinterest boards and photos of rooms they love. You review the direction before you meet.

E-Design Enquiries

Explain how remote e-design works for single rooms, take the room details and photos, and route the enquiry to your online design package. Perfect for clients outside your area or on a tighter budget.

Service Tier Guidance

Explain the difference between e-design, a paid consultation, full-service design and commercial projects so callers understand what each involves and where their brief fits before they book.

Trade and Supplier Routing

Recognise joiners, upholsterers, fabric houses and showrooms ringing about live schemes and route them to the right project manager, so principals aren't pulled off client work for an order update.

Commercial and Developer Enquiries

Spot enquiries from developers, landlords, hospitality and office fit-outs, and flag them as priority. A prompt, polished response wins larger commercial projects that would otherwise go to the studio that replied first.

Pre-Consultation Questionnaire

After booking, text a short design questionnaire covering how the client lives, storage needs, how they entertain and what they want the space to feel like. The homework is done before you meet, so the consultation is far more productive.

Portfolio and Guide Requests

Email your portfolio, process overview and pricing guide the moment a caller asks, so prospects arrive at the consultation already familiar with your work and how you charge.

Multi-Language Answering

Answer callers in several languages so international buyers and non-English-speaking clients can enquire about a project without you needing to organise bilingual cover.

See It In Action

Real call transcript: Whole-Home Design Enquiry Booked Into a Paid Consultation

Duration: 3 min 40 sec • Outcome: Initial consultation booked at the property, brief and budget captured for a full-service project

AI Receptionist:
"Good evening, thank you for calling Refined Interiors. This is Claire. How can I help with your project?"
Customer:
"Hi, we've just bought a Victorian terrace in Bristol and it needs doing top to bottom. I found your portfolio online and loved the schemes."
AI Receptionist:
"Congratulations on the new home, that sounds like a lovely project. Could you tell me a little about the property? Roughly how large is it and which rooms you'd like designed?"
Customer:
"It's about 160 square metres over three floors. Four bedrooms, two bathrooms, a kitchen-diner and a sitting room. It's a full renovation, so everything from layout to furnishings."
AI Receptionist:
"Understood, a full-house renovation and furnishing. Do you have a timescale in mind for when you'd like it finished?"
Customer:
"We're renting nearby and hoping to move in within about six months, once the building work's done."
AI Receptionist:
"That's a sensible run of time. Have you thought about a budget for the design and furnishings, so I can point you to the right service?"
Customer:
"For the design fees and the furnishings together we're thinking somewhere around £30,000 to £45,000. This is our first time using a designer."
AI Receptionist:
"That sits comfortably within our full-service design. We'd start with an initial consultation at the property so the designer can see the space, talk through how you live and your colour and material preferences, and agree a timescale. The consultation is £250, credited against your design fee if you go ahead. Shall I book that in?"
Customer:
"Yes please. What have you got available?"
AI Receptionist:
"I have Thursday the 3rd at 2pm, Friday the 4th at 10am, or Monday the 7th at 4pm. Which suits you both?"
Customer:
"Friday the 4th at 10am works well."
AI Receptionist:
"Lovely. I'm booking Friday the 4th at 10am with Emma, our principal designer, at the property. I'll text you a payment link for the £250 consultation fee and a short design questionnaire to complete beforehand. What's the best mobile number for you?"
Customer:
"It's 07700 900456, and the postcode is BS8 2QF."
AI Receptionist:
"Perfect, that's all booked. You'll have the text with the payment link and questionnaire in the next few minutes. Is there anything else I can help with?"
Customer:
"No, that's everything. Thank you so much."

Syncs With the Tools Designers Run On

Works alongside Houzz Pro, Studio Designer, Programa, Mydoma Studio and Xero, so consultations and site visits book straight into your calendar and every enquiry lands in your CRM with scope, budget and preferences captured. No manual data entry from voicemail.

HP
Houzz Pro
SD
Studio Designer
D
DesignFiles
MS
Mydoma Studio
P
Programa
DM
Design Manager
X
Xero
Q
QuickBooks

What Your AI Receptionist Captures on a Design Enquiry

Inbound to a design studio is overwhelmingly new-enquiry qualification rather than emergencies, and designers filter hard on budget fit, so capturing the budget and scope up front saves wasted consultation slots. Many enquiries are unqualified, wanting a decorator or simply price-shopping, so the agent tags each one and routes the details into your CRM while you're out on site visits, at supplier meetings or in client presentations.

  • Project type: full refurbishment or a single room
  • Property type: flat, terrace, period home or new-build
  • Rough budget band for design and furnishings
  • Timeline and desired move-in or completion date
  • Full-service design or e-design
  • Residential or commercial project
  • Postcode and consultation preference: in person or virtual

Frequently Asked Questions

Can DeskCaller qualify the budget and scope before booking a consultation?

Yes. DeskCaller asks about the project scope and the furnishings and design-fee budget up front. Single-room briefs on a tighter budget are pointed to e-design or a virtual consultation, full-house and renovation projects are booked into a discovery call, and larger commercial fit-outs are routed to the principal designer. You stop giving up consultation time to enquiries that were never the right fit.

Can it capture colour and material preferences, mood boards and inspiration before we meet?

Yes. After booking, DeskCaller texts a short design questionnaire that asks about the client's style, colour and material leanings and how they use the space, and invites Pinterest boards, Instagram links and photos of rooms they love. You review the direction before the consultation and arrive with relevant portfolio examples and samples, so the meeting is far more productive.

How does it handle the difference between e-design, full-service and commercial projects?

DeskCaller works out the likely service tier from the scope, budget and timescale. Single-room enquiries hear how remote e-design works. Whole-home and renovation projects are routed to full-service design covering space planning, schemes, procurement and installation. Developer, hospitality and office fit-out enquiries are flagged as commercial and sent to the right person. Each tier has its own script explaining your process and deliverables.

What happens when developers or commercial clients call about a larger project?

DeskCaller recognises language like developer, landlord, fit-out, hospitality and multi-unit and flags the enquiry as a priority commercial lead, routing it to a principal straight away. A prompt, professional response wins larger projects, because commercial clients approach several studios and tend to go with whoever replies first with a clear next step.

Can it handle trade and supplier calls separately from client enquiries?

Yes. DeskCaller identifies joiners, upholsterers, fabric houses and showrooms ringing about live schemes and routes them to the relevant project manager rather than interrupting a principal mid-consultation. Trade coordination is handled promptly while your designers stay focused on client-facing and billable work.

Is DeskCaller GDPR compliant with how it handles client details?

It is. Client briefs, mood-boards and budgets are commercially sensitive, so DeskCaller holds them to UK GDPR standards throughout: encryption in transit and at rest, storage on UK-based servers, and role-based access controls that keep a caller's brief and budget visible to your studio alone.

How quickly can we go live during a busy period?

You can be live the same day. Set it up yourself in a couple of hours through self-serve onboarding, or we do it for you: connect your calendar and CRM, load your service tiers and pricing, set your consultation fee and your brand-voice greeting, and you're answering every call within the day. No hardware, and it handles a surge in enquiries without you taking on extra cover.

Does it work for a solo designer as well as a larger studio?

Yes. A solo designer can let DeskCaller answer while they're on site visits and route everything into one calendar, while a larger studio can direct enquiries to associates, e-design or the principal depending on the brief. It scales to how your practice is organised without changing how you like to work.

Ready to Capture Every Design Enquiry?

Answer 24/7 while you're on site visits, qualify scope and budget, and book paid consultations automatically. From single rooms to full-house and commercial projects. Most studios go live the same day.

Explore AI receptionists for related trades

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Pricing

Simple pricing, no surprises

Choose a plan, or just pay for what you use. One flat price, never a surprise charge.

Save 25%
Starter
For solo owner-operators answering their own phone.
£48/mo
billed monthly
 
120 mins/mo · ~40 calls
£0.40 per included minute
Grace: up to 12 extra minutes
Run over and you keep going. Borrowed minutes come off next month's allowance, never a charge.
One flat price
Most Popular
Growth
For small teams that never want to miss a job.
£105/mo
billed monthly
 
300 mins/mo · ~100 calls
£0.35 per included minute
Grace: up to 45 extra minutes
Run over and you keep going. Borrowed minutes come off next month's allowance, never a charge.
One flat price
Pro
For multi-crew operators with high call volume.
£225/mo
billed monthly
 
750 mins/mo · ~250 calls
£0.30 per included minute
Grace: up to 150 extra minutes
Run over and you keep going. Borrowed minutes come off next month's allowance, never a charge.
One flat price
No setup fee·No contract·30-day money-back·Usage alerts at 60 / 80 / 90%