Smith.ai vs TradieCall for NZ trades
Looking at Smith.ai from NZ? Read this first.
Smith.ai is a big, capable US virtual receptionist service. It is also built for US businesses: USD billing, North America-based agents, and add-ons charged per call. Here's what that adds up to for an NZ tradie, next to a local AI receptionist priced in NZ dollars.
What Smith.ai charges, in the currency you'd pay it in
Smith.ai runs two products. The human receptionist plans start at US$300/mo for 30 calls, with overage at US$11.50 per call once you're past your bundle. The higher tiers are US$810/mo for 90 calls and US$2,100/mo for 300. Their AI receptionist is separate: a free tier (25 calls, card required, then US$3.00 per call), a Pro plan at US$150/mo, and Enterprise at US$500/mo.
The base price isn't the whole story, though. On the human plans, most of the things a tradie would consider table stakes are per-call add-ons: appointment booking is +US$1.50 per call, an SMS or Slack notification is +US$0.50 per call, call recording is +US$0.25 per call, and a follow-up call is another +US$0.50. Extra transfer destinations run US$15/mo each. None of these are outrageous on their own. Stacked across a month of calls, they turn a US$300 plan into something you can't predict until the invoice lands, and the NZD figure then depends on whatever the exchange rate is doing.
At TradieCall the equivalent features are in the flat price: every call gets a text and email job sheet within a minute, recordings and transcripts are included, and diary booking on the Pro plan has no per-call fee. Plans are $129, $249 and $449 NZD/mo, GST included. Our virtual receptionist cost guide walks through the maths against other services too.
Smith.ai and TradieCall, side by side
Smith.ai prices are in USD as published on their pricing page in August 2026 and may have changed since. TradieCall prices are NZD including GST.
| Smith.ai | TradieCall | |
|---|---|---|
| Human receptionists availableTradieCall is AI only | ||
| Priced in NZD, GST includedSmith.ai bills in USD; your NZD cost moves with the exchange rate | ||
| Flat monthly price, no per-call add-onsSmith.ai: booking +US$1.50, SMS +US$0.50, recording +US$0.25 per call | ||
| Text and email job summary includedan SMS notification is a US$0.50/call add-on at Smith.ai | ||
| Recordings and transcripts includedrecording is a US$0.25/call add-on at Smith.ai | ||
| Appointment booking at no extra per-call costUS$1.50/call at Smith.ai; included on TradieCall Pro, no per-call fee | ||
| Spam calls blocked free and never billedsee the BBB complaint discussed below | ||
| NZ voice and NZ-focused setupSmith.ai agents are North America-based; no published NZ support | ||
| Wide integration catalogue and enterprise plansSmith.ai's breadth is genuinely strong here | ||
| Free trial without a card on fileSmith.ai's AI free tier needs a card; 25 calls, then US$3.00/call |
The spam-call problem with per-call billing
When every answered call costs money, the calls you didn't want still cost money. According to a complaint on Smith.ai's BBB profile, one customer was billed roughly US$300 in overage for 163 spam calls after a billing-policy change, and the complaint is listed as unanswered. We can't verify the customer's side of that story, and Smith.ai hasn't responded to it publicly. But the structural point stands on its own: per-call billing puts the risk of spam volume on you.
TradieCall takes the opposite position. Spam and robocalls are blocked free, and a blocked call is never billed. Your plan price is the same in a quiet month and in a month when an autodialler finds your number.
There's a wider lesson in it. Reviews of answering services, across the whole industry, complain about billing far more often than they complain about call quality. The service can be good and the invoice can still hurt. Before you sign up with anyone, us included, work out what a bad month costs, not just a normal one. Per-call pricing with per-call add-ons makes that maths genuinely hard. A flat plan makes it a one-line answer.
Where Smith.ai genuinely wins
A fair comparison cuts both ways. Smith.ai has real human receptionists on staff, and for long, complicated calls a trained person is still better than any AI, ours included. Their integration catalogue is wide (CRMs, chat, marketing tools) and their Enterprise tiers carry features a large firm would expect. They've been at this for years and the product is mature.
So who should still pick Smith.ai? A US-focused business that wants human reception, works US hours, uses US software, and is happy budgeting in US dollars. If that's you, they're a strong choice. If you're quoting jobs in Henderson and your callers say "chur", the fit gets awkward fast. And if what you want is a human service closer to home, our ReceptionHQ comparison covers the main NZ-facing option, while the hiring-a-receptionist breakdown runs the numbers on employing someone yourself.
The NZ alternative, priced in NZ dollars
TradieCall is an AI phone answering service built for one market: NZ trade businesses. It answers 24/7 in a natural Kiwi voice, captures the caller's name, number, address, the job and how urgent it is, then texts and emails you the job sheet within a minute. Urgent calls get flagged, and on the Pro plan they can be transferred to you live. It never invents prices for your work; if a caller pushes for a quote you haven't set, it takes the details and leaves the pricing to you.
The difference shows up in an ordinary week. A hot water cylinder dies at 9pm on a Friday and the homeowner rings three plumbers. Two go to voicemail. The third gets answered in seconds by a receptionist that sounds local, takes the address and the symptoms, flags it urgent, and has the job sheet on the plumber's phone before the caller has found the fourth number. That call is worth hundreds of dollars, and it's the exact call a US-hours service is least set up to handle well, because 9pm Friday in Auckland is the middle of the night before in most of the US.
You keep your number: one forwarding code from your own phone, about 10 minutes of setup, and only the calls you miss go to the receptionist. There's a 7-day trial and no lock-in. If you want to see how the other well-known US name compares, we've done the same honest exercise for Ruby, which turns out not to serve NZ at all.
Straight answers
Judge it on your own missed calls
Set it up in about 10 minutes, forward your number for a week, and see what lands in your inbox. No card tricks, no per-call maths.
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