Why this exists
Small businesses take their enquiries on WhatsApp. How much for this, do you open Sunday, can you deliver to Tema. The message lands at 9pm, you read it at 7am, and the customer has already asked somebody else.
A plain chatbot is worse than the problem. It will quote 200 cedis for a job that costs 600, and you find out when the customer turns up. Front Desk works the other way round: the model reads the question and has no say over the price.
What it does
Each business gets its own catalogue, opening hours, WhatsApp number, and a persona so the wording sounds like them. The assistant answers from those, and can only do three things:
search_catalog— look up a price in your list. It must do this before quoting anything.capture_lead— write down the name and what they want, so you wake up to a lead.escalate_to_human— stop talking and fetch you.
Knowing when to stop talking
It fetches a person for complaints, refunds, an order gone wrong, or anyone who asks for a human. Haggling it handles itself — it has no authority to discount, so it holds your price rather than passing every bargainer to you. When it does hand over, you get a WhatsApp ping saying who is waiting and why, and it stays out of that chat afterwards.
It also gives up honestly. If it cannot answer, the customer is told someone will come back to them. A voice note or a photo gets the truth — it only reads text.
What keeps it safe
- Only real WhatsApp messages get through. Anything not properly signed by Meta is rejected.
- A repeated message is never answered twice. WhatsApp retries deliveries, so the second copy is dropped — no double reply, no double bill.
- One business can never see another's prices or customers. The database enforces that, not the screen.
Where it stands
Built and working end to end on a Meta test number, and ready for its first client — no business is running on it yet. Next: a dashboard so you can edit your own answers, an approved WhatsApp template so the handoff ping lands outside the 24-hour window, and Instagram DMs.
What it costs
Setup from $600 — your catalogue and hours loaded, the persona written to sound like your business, your number connected, and the handoff pointed at whoever answers. Then from $80 a month to run it and keep the answers current. Those are starting points; a fixed quote follows once I know the scope. See packages & pricing.
Meta's business verification is their decision on your documents. I prepare it and walk you through it, but I can't promise it. Running it is cheap. Meta charges nothing for replies inside the 24-hour window a customer opens, and the model comes to one or two US cents a conversation on published prices — there is no live traffic to measure yet.