Watch: How to teach the AI your shop's facts and answers in SalesThumb (1:00)
This is the Settings-side AI Assistant — not the same feature as Working with the AI Assistant, which is the ranked ops-insights feed at /app/ai-assistant (Urgent / Watch / Opportunities / FYI cards about your shop's data). This page, at Settings → AI Assistant (/app/settings/assistant), trains a different assistant entirely: the one that drafts replies to customer messages. It exists as a fallback for when the external chat platform your Inbox normally uses isn't connected, and it never answers from anything except what you enter here.
Capabilities: the facts it's allowed to use
Two switches sit at the top, each with a small status dot — green when live AI reply drafting is available for your shop, or amber when the shop is running in stub mode (reply drafting is a Growth feature, and it also drops to stub once your shop has used its AI allowance for the current 30-day period):
- Assistant enabled — the master switch.
- Auto-suggest replies — drafts a suggested reply in the Inbox whenever a customer messages.
If either switch is on while the shop is in stub mode, an amber banner spells it out: replies fall back to your Handoff message instead of a live AI answer, and points you at "Test it" to see exactly what customers get today.
Below the switches, a set of fields build the facts the assistant can draw from: About us (a short elevator pitch), Services we offer, Hours, Booking link (where it sends customers to book), Pricing guidance (what it may say about price — leave it blank and it will never quote a price at all), Policies (warranty, deposits, cancellations, mobile service), Brand voice / tone, Custom instructions (the highest-priority field — anything the AI must always or never do), and Handoff message (sent word-for-word when it genuinely can't answer). Hit Save to persist the form.
Knowledge base: approved answers it prefers verbatim
Below Capabilities, build a knowledge base of question/answer pairs — an optional category, the customer's question, and the exact answer you want given. The assistant is instructed to prefer these word-for-word over generating its own phrasing, so it's the right place for pricing specifics, warranty language, or anything else you want stated exactly one way. Add, edit, or delete entries inline.
Test it: verify before you trust it
The "Test it" box at the bottom lets you type a question the way a customer would and see the actual reply. The note under the answer tells you what you're looking at: "Grounded on N KB entries" for a live answer from the model, or, if your plan doesn't include the assistant or your shop has used its AI allowance for the period, a short message saying so instead of an answer. The "Preview (no API key set) — showing your handoff message" note appears only if the AI call itself fails (despite the wording, there's no key for you to set). Use this after any edit to Capabilities or the knowledge base — it's the only place you'll see the assistant's output before a real customer does.
What the assistant will and won't do
Behind the scenes it's told to keep replies short and texty (1–3 sentences), never quote a price outside your pricing guidance or knowledge base, never claim to book, schedule, or charge anything itself, use plain text with no markdown or bullet lists, and never reveal it's an AI. Your Brand voice/tone and Custom instructions fields are folded into those same rules, with Custom instructions taking priority over everything else.
After-hours receptionist
Further down the page, the After-hours receptionist card (Growth and up) works differently: when it's on, it replies to customer texts outside the business hours you set there by itself, and can create and send a quote, with no staff approval.
Your AI allowance
A small note near the top reminds you that the AI receptionist runs on your shop's 30-day AI allowance and stops answering when it is used up. It links to AI Booster: what prepaid AI credit does and doesn't cover and to your plans. AI Booster credit does not keep the receptionist answering.
Frequently asked questions
Q: Is this the same as the "AI Assistant" feed on the ops dashboard?
A: No. That's a separate feature at /app/ai-assistant that surfaces Urgent/Watch/Opportunity/FYI insights from your shop's live data. This Settings page trains the assistant that drafts replies to customer messages.
Q: What does the assistant actually do with what I enter here?
A: It uses your Capabilities fields and knowledge base Q&A as the only facts it's allowed to answer from, whether it's drafting a reply in the Inbox or answering in the Test It box — it's instructed never to invent prices, policies, hours, or services beyond what you've entered.
Q: What happens if the assistant can't answer a customer's question?
A: It replies with your exact Handoff message field, word-for-word. There's a default fallback ("Thanks for reaching out! Someone from our team will follow up shortly.") if you leave that field blank.
Q: How do I know if I'm seeing a real AI answer or a placeholder?
A: The Test it box's note under the answer says either "Grounded on N KB entries" (live) or "Preview (no API key set) — showing your handoff message" (stub, which appears only if the AI call itself fails; there's no key for you to set). If your plan doesn't include the assistant or your AI allowance is used up, you get a message saying so instead of an answer. Stub mode also shows an amber banner on the Capabilities form.
Q: What turns on the "Auto-suggest replies" behavior in the Inbox?
A: The Auto-suggest replies switch on this page. When it's on, the assistant drafts a suggested reply in the Inbox whenever a customer messages — separate from the master "Assistant enabled" switch.
Q: Should I use the pricing guidance field to state exact prices?
A: You can, but you don't have to — leave it blank and the assistant will never quote a price at all, offering a free quote or a handoff instead. If you do fill it in, keep it to ranges or "starting at" language rather than promises.