Book carpentry visits without mixing kitchen and door
Quick summary
- The assistant reads the book before it offers a morning, so a door that binds is never offered as a kitchen measure-up.
- A twenty-minute look at a leaf and a kitchen tape are different bookings. Get that wrong and a client sits in a slot reserved for a run.
- Wardrobe, door, kitchen or summer bind first. Then the piece. Then the book.
- Anything that sounds like a price, a fit before the tape, or a door that will stay shut through August stays a callback.
- If the assistant cannot read the book, it takes a callback. It does not guess.
- The assistant texts the morning, the type, and what to leave clear, so the opening you arrive to is an opening you can tape.
TL;DR
You are in a hallway with the tape. A caller who wants a morning will not wait for a callback just to learn whether Thursday is free. An assistant can book those mornings if it reads the book first, treats a binding door as different from a kitchen, and asks which piece before it places anything. A photo is a measure-up. A fit is not a measure-up. An August promise is not a visit type — wood moves. If the book cannot be reached, the assistant does not guess. It takes the request and says so. The assistant texts the morning, the type, and what to leave clear.
Key takeaways
- Give the assistant the types and their real durations before you let it book — wardrobe, door look, kitchen, summer bind, fit.
- Mark June weeks, old-kitchen-still-in days and August in the same book it reads.
- Test a move on an existing door look and on a kitchen measure-up, separately, before you test a new wardrobe.
- Turn on the SMS at the moment of booking, with the list of what to leave clear for that type.
- If the book cannot be reached, the only answer is a callback.
- Check the first fifty bookings by hand. That is when you find the hour that was a kitchen put into a plane.
When someone wants a morning and you are in a hallway
One of you has the tape on a wardrobe opening. The other is hanging a leaf. The phone rings.
A owner wants Thursday morning for a kitchen tape. A person whose door binds wants someone today. A client wants twenty minutes to look at a holiday-house leaf. You cannot pick up. The opening is out of square.
Those three callers are asking for a morning. They are not asking for the same morning.
The first one needs you, a tape, and a run. The second needs a door look, and whether a plane is enough. The third needs a short look, and only if you take holiday houses this week. If the assistant treats them as the next free hour, Thursday morning fills with a plane, the kitchen arrives while you are on a leaf, and the wardrobe is offered on a morning the old cabinets are still in.
The assistant books only if three things are true. The type is one you offer. The morning is free in the book the shop works from. Nothing in the call is a price, an August promise, or a fit before the tape. If any of those fail, it takes a request and says someone will call back.
A person who has to wait for a callback just to learn whether Thursday works has time to ring the next workshop. That is why the morning has to be finished on this call. It is also why a guessed confirmation is worse than no confirmation. The client empties the run. Nobody is free.
A binding door is not a kitchen measure-up
You already know this. The assistant does not, until you teach it.
A door look is twenty minutes on a leaf. Someone is there to see whether it still latches. You stay on the other opening. The caller is told to leave the door on its hinges.
A kitchen measure-up is you, a tape, and walls that are never square. You have come off the other job. The old cabinets are out, or you have noted that you will measure around them.
A wardrobe is an opening, not a run. A fit day is units that have been made. A summer bind is wood movement, not a new kitchen.
If the assistant cannot tell these apart, you spend Thursday on people who only needed a plane, and the person who needed an hour on a run is given twenty minutes at the door.
Give it the types and the real durations before it is allowed to offer anything:
- Wardrobe measure-up
- Door look or new leaf
- Fitted kitchen measure-up
- Summer bind
- Fit after a quote
- Anything you do not want booked at all
People who just had a fitter in often call after the old cabinets come out. The assistant can offer a measure-up tomorrow. It cannot offer a fit today if you have not taped the run. Do not give a door look to that caller, and do not give a kitchen a twenty-minute plane when they asked for a tape on the walls.
Which piece, then the job, then any morning
The first question on this line is not when they are free. The first question is wardrobe, door, kitchen or summer bind.
Those are different jobs. Different openings. Usually different lengths of visit. A built-in wardrobe is not a fitted kitchen. A fit is not a first tape. The confirmation, the reminder, and what to leave clear are different.
A caller who is both still gets two notes. If they want a kitchen taped and also a bedroom door looked at, they get a measure-up and a short look. Do not squeeze a run and a leaf into twenty minutes because they arrived as one call.
On a change it is the same question, first. “Move Thursday” is not enough. Thursday might be the door look or the kitchen tape. Both can share one mobile number. If the assistant picks the first match, it moves the wrong visit.
Ask which piece. Then the address or the name on the file. Then find the existing morning. Then move it.
Two clients in the same block are common. Two kitchens after a fitter week are common. A surname plus “the kitchen” is not always enough. Take the floor. Take the room. Do not invent a match because the first three letters agree.
If they will not say which visit, it is not a booking yet and it is not a change yet. Take the name and the number and say someone will call back. Do not guess.
Mornings you have already closed
You already know which mornings you tape kitchens and which mornings the book is closed because the old cabinets are still in, or because you are on a leaf that cannot be left. Put those mornings in the book the assistant reads. If they exist only on a pad in the workshop, the assistant cannot see them.
On a closed morning you still take the phone, or the assistant does. A fit is not offered. A door look can still be offered if someone will be near.
If a closed morning is missing from that book, the assistant will offer 09:00 on a day both of you are already on timber. The client arrives with the run empty. The wardrobe and the new tape are then the same morning.
Fit days are for work you have already quoted and agreed.
August needs its own dates. Some of you close for two weeks. The published number still rings. Set the closure dates. Do not let the assistant book a measure-up into a week when nobody is in the shop.
If you do not hang hollow doors this month, say so before a hanging is offered. A shop that does not do kitchens should say so on the first call, not after a booked tape.
Moving a morning that already exists
A caller who already has a Thursday is not making a new booking. They are changing one.
Handled as cancel-then-book, Thursday is still taken by their own visit. The assistant tells them that morning is not free.
The order is: which piece, address or name on the file, find the existing morning, release it, place the new one. One change. Reversed, or split into two independent operations, the client is blocked by their own hour.
Let them cancel as well, especially on measure-ups after a fitter has delayed. A cancellation the day before is a morning you can give to someone whose door still binds. The same cancellation arriving as a no-show is a morning gone. Write cancellations back to the book the same way bookings are written.
A same-day move in June is tighter. If Thursday is already a list of binding doors and they want to move a kitchen onto Thursday, refuse the kitchen and offer a later window, or take a callback. Do not squeeze them into the hour before you go back on a leaf.
An August promise is not a booking type
People ask while they book. A owner moving a door look will ask whether it will stay shut in the heat. A person booking a kitchen will ask for a round figure. A client booking a fit will ask whether you can begin without seeing the opening.
None of those is a booking type.
The assistant says someone has to see the leaf. Then it finishes the morning, if there is a type you actually offer. It does not invent an “it will not move” chat. It does not name a price to win the booking. It does not say the door will stay shut through August. It does not pretend Thursday is a fit because the fitter named it.
If they press — “just put a fit in, the old kitchen is out” — the assistant still refuses the fit. It can offer a measure-up if that morning is free. The fit stays yours, after the tape and the quote.
A street door that will not latch and a flat that is open is not a booking. It is a flag to a phone you actually hold. The assistant collects a name and a number while it is connecting. It does not tell them to take the leaf off.
What to leave clear, in the same text as the morning
A wardrobe measure-up on an opening still full of hanging clothes is not a measure-up. A kitchen tape with the old cabinets still in, when you needed them out, is not a tape. A door look with the leaf already taken off and stacked in the yard is a visit you cannot finish the way you meant.
The assistant texts the morning, the type, and what to leave clear — clothes out, old kitchen out if you need it out, leaf left on its hinges. That text is the difference between a morning you can use and a morning you drive to and leave.
If they booked in English, the text goes out in English. If they booked in Greek, it goes out in Greek. 70+ languages. The reminder follows the same language.
Do not let the assistant text a fit list for a measure-up. The units do not need to be in the van for a tape. They need to be in the van for a fit. Mix those lists and the client thinks you are beginning on a morning you only meant to measure.
What you set first
Give it the types and the real durations. Mark June weeks, old-kitchen-still-in days, and August. Require which piece before any morning. Turn on the SMS with the clear list for that type. If the book cannot be reached, the only answer is a callback.
Check the first fifty bookings by hand. That is when you find the kitchen that was put into a plane, and the fit that was offered before the tape.
Rates live on the pricing section of the home page. They are not repeated here.
A fitter’s Thursday is not a hole in the book
The fitter said Thursday. Three flats heard it. None of those runs is yours until you have been on them with a tape, and the units are made.
If the assistant treats “the fitter is out Thursday” as a fit, you own three mornings you cannot keep. Book the measure-up. Hold the fit until the quote is agreed. If the old kitchen is still in, move the morning. Do not keep Thursday just to sound fast.
A holiday house just opened is the same shape with different timber. None of the doors close. That is several short looks, or one flagged visit, not a kitchen morning. Do not let the assistant put a four-hour kitchen into a house that only needed planes.
The book the shop already uses is the only book. A second list on paper next to the plane is how a morning gets offered twice.
What these bookings sound like
The order is the piece, then a morning the book can honour, then the refusal said out loud. There is no round figure over a kitchen nobody has taped. There is no “it will stay shut in August”. There is no fit because a fitter named Thursday.
If the assistant is friendly and still puts a fit in, you own that morning. Put the person who rang about the kitchen at 11:10 on a measure-up, not on a fit day the units cannot support.
AI receptionist, in-house staff, or a call centre
| CITT | In-house | Call centre | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Reads the book before offering a morning | Yes, the book the shop works from | Yes | Usually not — takes a message |
| Books evenings and Saturday mornings | Yes, if you marked them | No | Sometimes |
| Treats a binding door as different from a kitchen | If you marked the two types | Yes | Rarely sees the week |
| Starts with which piece | Yes — before it looks at the book | Yes | Often jumps to what morning |
| Books a fit before the tape | Never — the quote is after the measure-up | Only after the quote is agreed | Sometimes books "a fit chat" |
| Sends the confirmation and what to leave clear | Automatically, by SMS | If they remember | Sometimes |
What a month of empty kitchen measure-ups costs
Worked from these assumptions — change any of them and the answer changes:
- Two people. About 22 booked mornings a month to measure a wardrobe, look at a door, or tape a kitchen.
- An empty kitchen morning is not given to someone else the same day.
- About 12% of booked mornings arrive with the old cabinets still in, or nobody is in. Check your own figure. Shops vary.
- Recoverable value of a used morning, €200. Put your own figure in. A kitchen measure-up and a twenty-minute door look are not the same.
- A reminder that names what to leave clear cuts empty mornings by a third. Challenge this first.
- 22 mornings × 12% = about 3 empty mornings a month.
- 3 × €200 = €600 of reserved time sitting empty.
- A third avoided returns about €200 a month.
- Over 10 working months — 10 × €200.
Roughly €2,000 a year, from a text that names the opening, not only the morning.
What it costs
CITT is pay as you go: no packages, no minimum, no contract. The current rates — the monthly fee per number and the per-minute rate — are on the pricing section of the home page, which is the only place they are published.
Frequently asked questions
Can it book a kitchen measure-up while I am in a hallway?
It reads the same book the shop works from and checks the morning before offering it. A morning you have closed because you are hanging a leaf, or because the old kitchen is still in, is never offered as a fit, if you marked it. Door looks can still be offered that day if someone will be near. If the assistant cannot reach the book at that moment, it does not guess. It takes the request as a callback and says so. A visit the shop has no record of is worse than no visit. The client turns up with the run empty and nobody is free.
What about someone moving an existing morning?
The assistant asks which job first — wardrobe, door, kitchen, summer bind or fit — then the address or the name on the file, and treats the move as one change. Handled as cancel, then book, Thursday is still taken by their own visit, and they are told that morning is not free. A client who has a door look and a kitchen tape on the same phone must say which visit is moving.
Will it book a morning to promise the door will stay shut in August?
It will book a look so you can see the leaf, if you allow that type. It will not book a session in which the assistant itself promises wood will not move. Movement in a Greek summer is yours to explain, after you have seen the timber. A person, not the voice on the phone.
Should it book a fit against any free morning because the fitter said Thursday?
A fit is units that have been made, and an opening you have already taped. Mark fit days as their own type. The assistant does not put Thursday in the book because a fitter named it. If the old kitchen is still in, that is a move, not a fit. The assistant takes the room and offers only the kind of visit you marked.
Who sends the confirmation?
The assistant, by SMS, in the language of the conversation, at the moment of booking, including what to leave clear for that type — hanging clothes out of the wardrobe opening, the old kitchen out if you need it out, the leaf left on its hinges. The reminder goes out ahead of the morning on the schedule you set. Neither requires anyone in the shop to type a number.
Can clients cancel through it too?
Yes, and you should let them, especially on measure-ups after a fitter has delayed. A cancellation the shop hears about the day before is a morning that can go to someone whose door still binds. The same cancellation arriving as a no-show is a morning gone. Cancellations are written back to the book the same way bookings are.
