Your brain answers the phone.
An AI receptionist that answers 24/7 — books reservations against your rules, takes messages, transfers to a human on request, and only says what your business actually knows. Your website's Ask widget answers visitors; now your phone number does too.
Open the line in four steps.
No phone system, no scripts to write, no IVR trees. If your brain knows it, your phone knows it.
Pick a brain
Point Front Desk at the Ounie brain that holds your hours, menu, prices, and policies. That's the only thing the receptionist is allowed to say.
Get your number
We provision a local number in seconds — or keep the number you have and forward it to us. Cancel any time; your number is held 30 days.
Set hours & booking rules
Slot length, capacity per slot, lead time, blackout dates, a transfer number. Availability comes from your rules — never an AI guess.
Read the book
Every call lands on your dashboard: full transcripts, a booking book, a message inbox — with an email when something needs you.
Every missed call is a customer who called someone else.
Restaurants
Reservations with party size against your table capacity, plus menu questions answered straight from your brain — during service, when nobody can reach the phone.
Salons & studios
Appointments by service — a cut books a 45-minute slot, a color blocks two. Callers hear real availability from your rules, and no-shows get rebooked from the dashboard.
Clinics
Scheduling only, on purpose: recordings stay off and the agent never takes medical details — Front Desk is not for PHI. Anything clinical becomes a callback message.
Not for medical information — scheduling and messages only.
Local services
Plumbers, electricians, cleaners: credentials and service-area questions answered from your brain, quote requests taken as messages with a number to call back.
It only says what your business knows.
And it opens every call the same way: by saying it's an AI. That disclosure is fixed — not a setting.
Answers retrieved live
Every factual answer comes from a search of your Ounie brain during the call — your hours, your menu, your prices, your policies. Nothing is invented to sound helpful.
Unknown means “I don't know”
When the brain doesn't have it, the agent says so plainly and offers to take a message — a wrong answer on your business line is worse than no answer.
Availability is your rules
Slots, capacity, and lead time come from settings you wrote — checked deterministically and race-safe at booking time, never guessed by a language model.
If a caller mentions an emergency, the agent tells them to hang up and dial 911. In all-party-consent states a recording preamble plays before any recording starts — and for clinics, recordings stay off.
The reception desk is an API.
Every surface is a REST endpoint and a native MCP tool. Point Claude, Cursor, or your Ounie AI Team at Front Desk to read call outcomes, adjust greetings, hours, and booking rules, and work the message inbox — drawing your shared Ounie credits. One Ounie master key works across every Ounie app, and the money is server-enforced: an agent can never overdraw your wallet.
Account-less agents can pay in USDC via x402 for the lead compliance scrub only — timezones, consent flags, calling windows. Answering calls always requires an Ounie account.
// Connect from any MCP host (Claude, Cursor, the AI SDK)
{
"mcpServers": {
"front-desk": {
"url": "https://frontdesk.ounie.com/api/mcp",
"headers": { "Authorization": "Bearer fdk_live_…" }
}
}
}
// …or the Ounie AI Team — the key rides the URL:
// https://frontdesk.ounie.com/api/mcp?api_key=fdk_live_…No subscription. Pay for calls that happen.
Usage draws your shared Ounie credit wallet — 1 credit = 1¢. Every answered call reserves a small deposit and refunds the unused part automatically.
A 3:07 call that books a table: 48 cr of talk time + 5 cr for the booking = 53 credits ≈ $0.53.
The questions everyone asks.
Do I keep my phone number?
Yes — keep the number your customers know and forward it to the Front Desk number we provision for you (call forwarding is a carrier setting, usually two minutes to set up). Full number porting is on the roadmap. If you'd rather start fresh, we give you a new local number in seconds.
What happens after hours?
Whatever you choose. By default the AI answers 24/7 — that's the point. If you set business hours, it still answers outside them, tells callers you're closed, answers questions, and takes messages; bookings are only offered inside your rules.
How does it know my menu and prices?
From your Ounie brain — the knowledge base you build on ounie.com from your docs, menus, links, and notes. The agent searches it live during the call, so every factual answer traces back to something you wrote or saved. Update the brain and the phone knows it on the next call.
Can callers reach a human?
Yes. Set a transfer number and anyone who asks for a person is cold-transferred to it. If nobody picks up, the agent takes a message instead — the caller never dead-ends.
What if I run out of credits?
Callers hear a brief unavailable message — they're never billed and your line is never a dead number. Nothing answers without a reserved deposit, so your balance can't go negative. Top up on ounie.com and the line resumes automatically.
Is it HIPAA compliant?
No — and we say so plainly. Front Desk is for scheduling and messages only: for clinics, call recordings are off and the agent never takes medical details. Anything clinical becomes a callback message for your staff.
What does a typical call cost?
Talk time is 15 credits per answered minute, billed in 6-second increments. A 40-second "are you open?" call is about 11 credits (~$0.11); a 3:07 call that books a table is 48 + 5 = 53 credits (~$0.53). Unanswered calls cost nothing.
Can it take reservations without double-booking?
Yes. Availability comes from rules you set — slot length, capacity per slot, lead time, blackout dates — and every booking is checked and written race-safe at capture time. The AI never guesses a free slot; it can only book what your rules allow.
Give your phone a front desk.
Pick a brain, get a number, and take your first booking today. If a call goes unanswered, it costs nothing.