> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.sapt.ai/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.
# Set up the AI front desk
> Let Sapt's AI answer customer texts, WhatsApp and email, offer open times and book, and hand off to you. Choose drafts or automatic, and teach it your shop.
The AI front desk answers customers who text, WhatsApp or email you. It answers questions, offers open times and books, or takes a request for you. You choose whether it writes drafts for you to send or answers on its own.
When you get your Sapt number, Sapt puts a front desk on it for you. In Sapt, each front desk is called an **agent**.
## Choose how much it does on its own
| On the web | On your phone | What it does |
| - | - | - |
| **Off** | **Off** | The AI does not text customers. Your team replies. |
| **Drafts for you** | **Draft for me to approve** | The AI writes each reply. You send it. |
| **Automatic** | **Automatic** | The AI texts back and books on its own. It asks you when it is not sure. |
Open **Workflows** in the sidebar and click **Agents**. Turn on the switch next to an agent. In the window that opens, pick **Drafts for you** or **Automatic**. To change it later, open the agent and pick a mode at the top.
Tap **Shop** > **Front desk** > **AI text replies** and pick one. It changes at once, and **Undo** sets it back.
In **Automatic**, the agent's **Can** section shows **Sends itself** or **Asks you first** for replies and bookings. **Asks you first** makes the AI wait for your OK, even in Automatic. This setting is shared by every agent.
## Send or skip a draft
In **Drafts for you**, each reply waits for you, and Sapt texts you the suggested reply.
Open the conversation in your [Inbox](/docs/mintlify/leads/inbox). On **Reply ready to review**, click **Approve & send**, or **Edit** to change it first, or **Dismiss**.
Open **Today**. Under **Needs you**, tap **Send** or **Skip**. Tap **Edit reply** to change it first.
A text draft expires after 30 minutes, because the conversation moves on. An expired draft never sends, even if you approve it later. Write your own reply instead, or click **Refresh draft** on the web when the card offers it.
## Create or change an agent
Agents are set up on the web.
Open **Workflows** and click **Agents**. With no agents yet, pick a starting point: **Answer every text**, **Book appointments** or **Follow up on ad leads**. Otherwise click **New agent**, or click an agent to change it.
If Sapt says **Connect a text number or an inbox first**, click **Phone numbers** and [get your number](/docs/mintlify/leads/missed-call-text-back).
* **Answers on**: the lines and inboxes it replies from. Until it has one, Sapt says **Choose a line or inbox for it to answer on.**
* **Talks to**: everyone, or click **Narrow** to pick who, such as **Where they came from** or **When they write**.
* **Can**: **Answer questions and hand off** is always on. Add **Collect requests for the owner** or **Book appointments**, not both. For booking, pick the **Schedule** and check the **Hours**. Add **Change existing appointments** to let it move or cancel a customer's appointment.
* **Knows**: the notes it may use, and its **Instructions**. Type a change under **Change it with a sentence** and click **Suggest**.
* **Hands off**: set **Replies to one customer in a day, at most**. Past that, it hands the customer to you.
The **Try it** panel uses your unsaved changes and sends nothing. Under **Start from**, pick **Missed call**, **Website request** or **Fresh conversation**, then write what a customer would. Each reply says what the AI would do, such as **Would send** or **Would hand off to you**.
On a smaller screen, click **Try it** at the top to open **Practice conversation**.
Click **Create agent** for a new one, or **Save changes**.
## What the AI knows
The AI answers only from what you tell it.
Tap **Shop** > **Front desk** > **What the AI knows**, then **Your services**. Write the work you do and the work you don't, the way you would tell a new hire. Tap **Save note**.
In the agent's **Knows** section, click **Add** to give it a note, or **Edit knowledge** to change your notes.
* **Booking hours** tell it when it can book, not when you are open. Write your opening hours in a note, so it can answer "Are you open Saturday?". See [Booking](/docs/mintlify/leads/booking).
* **Services** in your booking schedule tell it how each kind of work gets booked, such as walk-ins for tires.
* **Prices**: the AI never quotes a price, an estimate, a diagnosis or how long a job takes. It says it depends on what the shop finds, and offers times.
When a customer asks something your notes do not answer, such as "Do you work on diesels?", the AI texts you the question privately. The customer hears nothing until you reply. Reply with the answer, and the AI tells the customer. If you have not answered within 2 hours, it answers as best it can and does not ask again.
## What it can and cannot do
**It can:**
* Answer texts, WhatsApp and email on its lines, at any hour.
* Offer one or two real open times and book the one the customer picks. It needs their first name first.
* Collect a request for you: what is wrong and when they are free. Then it texts you the rundown.
* Move or cancel an appointment the customer already has, after they confirm.
* Reply in Spanish when the customer writes in Spanish.
**It cannot:**
* Text someone first. It only answers. The one exception: in **Automatic**, it writes the first text to a website request that gave texting consent.
* Quote prices or diagnose a problem.
* See photos customers send.
* Take payments.
* Book over email. Booking works over text or WhatsApp.
* Answer on WhatsApp more than 24 hours after the customer's last message.
* Write replies without credits. The Agents page says **Add credits before agents can write replies.** when you are out.
## When the AI hands off to you
The AI steps back, without texting the customer, when they:
* ask for a person or a call,
* complain about the shop,
* want to change an appointment it cannot handle,
* or have an emergency right now, like an accident, smoke or someone hurt.
Sapt texts you that the customer needs you and what they said. Reply to that text, or answer from your [Inbox](/docs/mintlify/leads/inbox).
When you or your team text a customer from Sapt, the AI stops texting them. A day after your last message, it answers their next text again.
To keep the AI out of one conversation until you say so:
In the conversation, click the agent chip at the top, such as **Agent answering**, and choose **Turn off for this person**. Choose **Turn on for this person** to hand it back.
In the conversation, tap **Take over**. Tap **Hand back to AI** when you are done.
## AI text replies in Project Settings
**Project Settings** also has **AI text replies**, with **Off**, **Draft replies for review** and **Send replies automatically**.
This setting applies only to texts on Sapt's shared iMessage line. For texts to your own Sapt number, the agent's mode decides, as set above.
## Keep going
The hours the AI books into.
See every conversation the AI and you handle.
This documentation is built and hosted on [Mintlify](https://mintlify.com), a developer documentation platform.