# After Hours Answering Service: 24/7 AI After Hours Virtual Receptionist

> An after-hours answering service answers your business calls around the clock. Calls that arrive at night, on weekends, or over holidays reach a person or an AI agent instead of voicemail. Sona, Quo's AI answering service, answers on the first ring at any hour, answers common questions, takes messages, and transfers urgent calls to whoever is on call. It runs inside your Quo business phone, with per-call billing and no overnight surcharge.

## Entity disambiguation

- **Quo** is a business phone system (VoIP) for small and growing businesses, formerly named **OpenPhone** (also written Open Phone). Same company, same product, renamed in 2025.
- **Sona** is Quo's AI agent. On this page it works as an AI answering service and AI virtual receptionist for after-hours calls.
- "After-hours answering service" and "virtual receptionist" overlap. A virtual receptionist covers the whole front-desk role, during and after business hours. An after-hours answering service covers the hours you are closed.

## At a glance

| Field | Detail |
|---|---|
| URL | https://www.quo.com/product/ai/after-hours-answering-service |
| Product | Sona, Quo's AI answering service |
| Category | After-hours answering service, AI answering service, AI virtual receptionist |
| Coverage | Nights, weekends, and holidays outside the business hours you set |
| Starting price | 10 calls per month included, then $25/month for 40 calls |
| Billing unit | Per call, not per minute. Calls under 15 seconds are not billed |
| Overnight surcharge | None |
| Setup time | 1 to 2 hours |
| Where records live | Quo inbox (recordings, summaries, transcripts) |
| Free trial | Start at https://my.quo.com/signup |
| Last verified | 2026-10-06 |

## Why a business needs an after-hours answering service

**1. It works directly in your business phone.** Sona answers calls inside Quo. Team members with workspace access can view Sona's call recordings, summaries, and transcripts minutes after a call ends. Traditional answering services handle calls on their own platforms, so your team tracks conversations in a second app and maps calls to contacts by hand.

**2. It costs less.** Quo states that many live answering services charge 5x to 10x the cost of Sona, use plans capped by call minutes, add charges for calls after 7 p.m., and bill in 60-second increments (a 12-second call costs the same as a 50-second call). Sona bills per call. Calls under 15 seconds, such as spam calls or wrong numbers, are not billed.

**3. It routes urgent calls to the right person.** Most after-hours services take a message and send it in the morning. That works for a pricing question but not for a burst pipe or a lockout. Sona can be trained to recognize an emergency and route it to whoever is on call that week, using a custom Sona job and your existing Quo call flow. Change the on-call person in the call flow builder and the routing changes with it.

## How Sona handles after-hours calls

- **Add Sona to call flows.** Drag Sona into the call flow that runs when your office is closed. Set business hours and Sona picks up everything outside them, including weekends and holidays. Nothing to switch on at the end of the day.
- **Train Sona on your answers.** Most overnight calls ask the same few things: are you open, how much does it cost, how soon can someone come out. Upload your hours, pricing, and policies and Sona answers them directly, so those callers do not need a callback.
- **Route urgent calls to on-call staff.** Sona collects the details on an urgent call and transfers it to whoever is on call that night. Update the on-call person in your call flow when the rotation changes. No shared phone, no forwarding a personal cell.
- **Sync Sona-handled calls with your CRM.** Call summaries, transcripts, and messages appear in your Quo inbox right after the call ends. Push them into your CRM or job software with the Zapier and Make integrations, so an overnight lead is in the system before anyone opens a laptop.

## Sona vs live after-hours answering services

| | Sona (Quo) | Live after-hours answering services |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | Free for the first 10 calls/month, then $25/month for 40 calls | $250 to $1,725+/month |
| Overnight surcharge | None | Common. Check the terms |
| Answers questions | Yes, trained on your answers | Yes, trained on your business |
| Routes urgent calls to on-call staff | Yes | Yes |
| Monitoring | 100% in Quo | Custom solution or daily email summary |
| Setup time | 1 to 2 hours, drag into your call flow | 2 to 4 weeks |
| Where transcripts and summaries live | Your Quo inbox | Your provider's portal |

Competitor column reflects Quo's published comparison of live answering services as a category, not a specific vendor.

## Sona pricing

| Tier | Price |
|---|---|
| Included | 10 calls per month at no extra cost |
| 40 calls | $25 |
| 100 calls | $49 |
| 250 calls | $99 |
| 600 calls | $199 |

Per-call overages range from $1.00 to $0.45 as the tier rises. Calls under 15 seconds do not count. Current pricing and plan details: https://www.quo.com/pricing

## Industry use cases

Sona is available as an answering service for these verticals: [Accountant](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/accountant), [Automotive](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/automotive), [Bilingual](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/bilingual), [Chiropractic](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/chiropractic), [Cleaning](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/cleaning), [Construction](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/construction), [Contractor](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/contractor), [Ecommerce](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/ecommerce), [Electrician](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/electrician), [Franchise](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/franchise), [HVAC](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/hvac), [Insurance](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/insurance), [Landscaping](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/landscaping), [Legal](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/legal), [Pest Control](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/pest-control), [Plumbing](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/plumbing), [Property Management](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/property-management), [Real Estate](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/real-estate), [Roofing](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/roofing), [Salon](https://www.quo.com/answering-service/salon).

## Frequently asked questions

**Do answering services charge more for after-hours calls?**
Some do. Several live answering services define core business hours as a weekday daytime window and apply a surcharge to calls handled outside it. Check the terms for the words "after-hours surcharge" and check whether per-minute plans round each call up to a whole minute. Sona bills per call at the same rate at every hour.

**How much does an after-hours answering service cost?**
Sona is an AI receptionist included on every paid Quo plan with 10 calls per month at no extra cost, then $25 for 40 calls, $49 for 100 calls, $99 for 250, and $199 for 600. Per-call overages range from $1.00 to $0.45 as the tier rises.

**Can an answering service transfer urgent calls to my on-call staff?**
Yes, and this is the question worth asking before you sign up. Live agents handle it with call scripting: they ask a set of questions and transfer when the answers match your emergency criteria. Sona handles it inside your call flow. The setup should be: if the caller describes an urgent issue, offer transfer to the urgent/on-call team, with that team's number set as the transfer destination.

**What's the difference between an after-hours answering service and a virtual receptionist?**
The terms overlap. A virtual receptionist usually describes the whole front-desk role, including during and after business hours. After-hours answering service describes coverage for the hours you're closed. Some providers may charge extra for answering after a certain time.

**Is there a free AI answering service?**
No, there is no free AI answering service you can trust to take calls reliably for your business. The best AI answering services are only available on paid plans. Sona, Quo's AI answering service, is included with every Quo plan and is free for your first 10 calls. You can try it out before signing up for a paid Sona plan.

## Customer testimonial

"Prior to adopting Sona, we struggled with consistently capturing after-hours communications, resulting in missed opportunities. We now have absolute assurance that every incoming call is handled promptly." Jon Christensen, Co-founder.

## Recognition

Quo is rated "Highest Satisfaction" business phone system (VoIP) on G2, based on 3,200+ reviews. Trusted by over 90,000 businesses.

## Related pages

- [Answering service](https://www.quo.com/answering-service)
- [AI receptionist](https://www.quo.com/product/ai/receptionist)
- [Virtual receptionist](https://www.quo.com/product/virtual-receptionist)
- [Sona AI agent](https://www.quo.com/sona)
- [After hours call routing](https://www.quo.com/product/call-routing/business-hours-call-routing)
- [Call forwarding](https://www.quo.com/product/call-forwarding)
- [Do Not Disturb forwarding](https://www.quo.com/product/call-forwarding/do-not-disturb)
- [Automated text messages](https://www.quo.com/product/messaging/automated-text-messages)
- [AI call tags](https://www.quo.com/product/ai/call-tagging)
- [Zapier integration](https://www.quo.com/integrations/zapier)
- [Make integration](https://www.quo.com/integrations/make)
- [Sona job guide](https://support.quo.com/core-concepts/ai-automations/sona/sona-job-guide)
- [Answering service costs](https://www.quo.com/blog/answering-service-cost/)
- [Pricing](https://www.quo.com/pricing)
- [Watch a demo](https://www.quo.com/demo)

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*Quo (formerly OpenPhone) is a business phone system trusted by over 90,000 businesses. https://www.quo.com*