Can an AI receptionist replace a receptionist completely?

Rarely, and that is not what it does best. A receptionist does much more than answer the phone, and calls that need judgement or are about the relationship belong with a person. Where an AI receptionist makes the biggest difference is in the hours nobody is there and in the peaks when several people call at once.

How do we know how many minutes we will use?

Look at the call log from your operator or phone system: incoming calls per month and average call length. If you start by letting the agent take only unanswered and out-of-hours calls, the volume will be smaller than the whole log. Start has no included minutes, so in the first month you only pay for what you actually use.

What if we get more calls than the plan includes?

You pay a per-minute price for the excess: NOK 3.50 a minute on Plus and NOK 3 a minute on Premium. Included minutes are shared across the whole account. Moving up a plan as volume grows gets you a lower per-minute price.

Which employer contribution rate applies to us?

It depends on the country and, in Norway, on which zone the business belongs to. Rates and rules change, so check the current level with the Swedish Tax Agency, the Norwegian Tax Administration or the Danish authorities for your own calculation.

AI receptionist vs human receptionist: the real cost

Start with the hours

A year has 8,760 hours. A full-time employee in the Nordics works roughly 1,700 to 1,800 of them once holidays and public holidays are taken out. That means three things:

Office hours take more than one person. Weekdays from eight to four or five come to 2,000 to 2,250 hours a year. Someone has to cover lunch, holidays and sick days, or the phone goes unanswered at exactly those moments.

Around the clock takes about five people. 8,760 hours divided by 1,750 is five full-time positions, before rota planning and overlap.

Peaks need more lines, not more hours. If three people call at 08:00, it doesn't help that someone is at the desk. Two of them end up in a queue.

An AI receptionist has none of those limits. It answers at 03:00 and takes several calls at once. That is why a comparison per monthly salary misleads: you are comparing one person who covers part of the hours with something that covers all of them.

What an employee costs

Salary is only the start. On top come employer payroll costs, which differ a lot across the Nordics: in Sweden employer contributions are 31.42 percent of salary for most employees; in Norway the employer's national insurance contribution is 14.1 percent in zone I and lower elsewhere; Denmark has no percentage-based payroll tax but a set of smaller fixed contributions such as ATP. Then add holiday pay, pension, workspace, equipment, training and the time of whoever manages the work.

As a worked example, not a market salary: in Norway's zone I, a monthly salary of NOK 45,000 carries NOK 6,345 in employer contribution, so the cost is already NOK 51,345 a month before holiday pay, pension and workspace. Use your own salary level, country and overheads.

What an AI receptionist costs

Here it is volume that drives the cost, not hours. You need two numbers: calls per month and average call length.

As an example: 300 calls a month averaging 2.5 minutes is 750 minutes. On Threll's price list, in Norwegian kroner, that comes to:

Plan	Calculation	Per month
Start	NOK 699 + 750 min × NOK 4	NOK 3,699
Plus	NOK 2,499 incl. 500 min + 250 min × NOK 3.50	NOK 3,374
Premium	NOK 3,999 incl. 2,000 min	NOK 3,999

At that volume Plus is cheapest. There is no setup fee if you set it up yourself, and no lock-in on monthly plans. Current prices are on the pricing page.

What the calculation misses

The numbers say AI is cheaper per covered hour. They don't say what you get for the money, and that is where the two differ.

A person is better at:

Calls where the relationship is the point – a customer about to cancel, a complaint that has escalated.
Matters that need judgement outside the rules, or a decision.
Recognising regulars and knowing what happened last time without looking it up.
Everything else a receptionist does: greeting visitors, sorting post, keeping things in order.

An AI receptionist is better at:

Answering straight away, every time, even when three people call at once.
Evenings, weekends, lunch and holiday weeks.
The recurring calls: opening hours, rebooking, “have you received my order”.
Always writing a summary, so no matter lives only in someone's head.

The most common answer is both

Most businesses that bring in an AI receptionist don't do it to cut a position, but so the person already on the phone has time for what needs a human. The agent takes the overflow, the evenings and the simple calls. The person at the desk takes the rest – and gets calls put through with a summary, so the customer doesn't start over.

How that handover should work is worth thinking through before you start. We cover it in designing escalation from voice agent to human, and what an AI receptionist does over an ordinary day in our guide.