What it costs to build, and what the monthly fee actually covers
Three things are on offer: the automation, the website for it to run on if you do not already have one, and looking after something that exists. Anything larger, meaning custom integrations, data pipelines or a complete application in production, is quoted per project. What each one covers is written out below in full. The figure is quoted once we have seen how the work reaches you today, and it comes back by email rather than on a call.
Quoted in US dollars, or in UAE dirhams if you would rather.
Automation
Work is waiting on a person: enquiries sitting unanswered overnight, jobs written into a calendar by hand, follow-ups nobody got to, the same details typed into two screens. Three fixed workflows: an instant reply that answers and prices, a booking that lands in your calendar, and a follow-up for anyone who goes quiet. Built onto the tools you already pay for, running under your own logins.
- Setup
- Quoted on enquiry
- Monthly
- Quoted on enquiry
- Pages
- The site you already have
Website
You have no website, or the one you have is past helping. Everything the business needs online and nothing it does not. Bought on its own, or alongside the automation so there is somewhere for it to arrive.
- Setup
- Quoted on enquiry
- Monthly
- Quoted on enquiry
- Pages
- Up to 5
Care
Something already exists and needs somebody watching it. A site, or a system built by someone who has since moved on. We keep it patched, monitored and working, and make your changes.
- Setup
- No setup fee
- Monthly
- Quoted on enquiry
- Pages
- The site you already have
What the monthly fee covers
Exact limits, because vague scope is how an arrangement like this goes wrong for both sides.
- Enquiries handled
- Unmetered
- Monitoring for silent failures
- Included
- A broken integration
- Fixed, 1 business day
- Workflows included
- 3
- Changes to the system
- 2 a month
- Turnaround on a change
- 48 hours
- Model and tool costs
- At cost, itemised
- Monthly report
- Arrived, answered, booked, lost
- Hosting, SSL and backups
- Included, with a website
- Domain name
- Yours, bought separately
- Where it runs
- Your accounts, your logins
- Reply to an email
- 1 business day
- Minimum term
- None
A change is a new rule, a new routing destination, a reworded reply, a new field in the log, or the ordinary content edits a site needs. A fourth workflow, a new system to integrate with, a redesign, or an application is not. Those are quoted before we start, and you see the number first. Model and tool costs are passed through at cost with the invoice attached; we do not mark them up, and we do not hide them inside the fee, which is also why the system is designed onto tools you already pay for wherever it can be.
When you pay
You pay nothing until the site is built and you have approved it. We write it, build it and send you a private link. The setup fee falls due when you say yes, and the site moves onto your domain once the payment clears. Until then it stays on that link. If you look at it and decide against it, you owe nothing and you owe no explanation.
That is an introductory arrangement for our first clients, not a permanent part of the pricing. If the review link has been with you for seven days without a reply, the site counts as approved.
The monthly fee starts the day the site goes live, not the day you enquire. It is billed monthly in advance and you can stop it with a month’s notice.
International clients pay by bank transfer, by Wise, or by card through a payment link.
Invoices are issued in US dollars by default, or in dirhams if you would rather. There is no surcharge for paying from abroad.
UAE clients are invoiced with 5% VAT. Services supplied to clients outside the UAE are treated differently under UAE VAT rules, and we confirm the exact treatment with our accountant and put it on your invoice rather than guess at it on a web page.
Questions people actually ask
You do, and more importantly it already lives in your accounts. The workflows run under your logins, the data sits in your spreadsheet or your CRM, the domain is registered in your name. We are not a layer you have to pass through. If we disappeared tomorrow the system would keep running, and that is deliberate.
There is no minimum term. Give us a month’s notice and we hand over the workflows, the credentials and the documentation, and remove our access. Nothing is switched off and nothing has to be rebuilt, because it is already running where it will keep running. What we will not do is take anything offline without telling you first.
Yes, and we would rather you did. If you already own one, we point it at the new site. If you do not, buy it yourself in your own name. We tell you exactly what to buy and set it up for you at no charge. It sits outside the price because what a domain costs depends entirely on the name: most are $10 to $20 (AED 40 to 75) a year, a few run to hundreds. Buying it yourself means it is permanently yours, whatever happens between us.
Yes, and it is the part that takes the longest. You send us what you have, whether that is an old site, a menu, photographs or notes, and answer a short list of questions. We write the pages. You get two rounds of changes before it goes live.
No. It runs month to month and you cancel with a month’s notice.
We are on GST (UTC+4). Nothing in the process needs both of us awake at the same time: you send things when it suits you, we reply within one business day, and you look at the link when it suits you. If you want a call, we send a scheduling link that shows our availability already converted into your timezone.
After you have seen the site and approved it. There is no deposit for our first clients: we build it, you review it on a private link, the setup fee falls due when you say yes, and the site goes live on your domain once the payment clears. The monthly fee starts on the day it goes live. If seven days pass with no reply to the review link, the site counts as approved.
Bank transfer, Wise, or a card payment link, whichever is least painful where you are. Invoices are in US dollars unless you ask for dirhams, and there is no extra charge for paying from another country.
Then a person catches it, because that is how it is set up on day one: every draft waits for approval and nothing sends by itself. Once you have watched it for a few weeks you decide which cases are safe to let through, usually the simple ones, and which always wait for a human. Complaints and anything about money stay with a person for as long as you want them to. You choose where that line sits, and you can move it.
Seven days from the point we have your content. If it takes three weeks to get us the photographs, it takes three weeks plus seven days.
That is the Care plan. We take over hosting, keep it patched, backed up and monitored, and make your two changes a month. If the site is beyond helping we will tell you that instead of taking the money.
Less than people expect, and you see the real number. A model call to read one enquiry and draft a reply costs a fraction of a cent, so a business taking a few hundred enquiries a month is usually in single figures of dollars. Tool subscriptions are the larger line. Both are passed through at cost with the invoice attached. We do not mark them up and we do not bury them in the monthly fee.
Close, but not the same thing. An AI receptionist answers the phone. This answers the enquiries that arrive in writing: the web form, WhatsApp, email. For most of the trades we work with that is now where the majority of enquiries land, and it is the half that sits unanswered overnight. If what you actually need is somebody picking up the phone, a voice product is the better fit and we will tell you so rather than sell you this.
The enquiry goes to the model to be read, and the answer comes back. It is not used to train anything and it is not kept by us. Everything that is stored, including the log, the bookings and the customer details, sits in your own accounts rather than ours. If you are in a regulated trade and need that written down properly, ask and we will put it in the contract.
Almost certainly, yes. The work is remote, so the only parts that change by country are the currency on your invoice and which tools your business already uses. That is why the demos are set in Dubai, London and Toronto rather than all in one place.
Yes, English and Arabic. The Arabic is written, not run through a translator, and the layout is built for right-to-left from the start. That adds to the setup fee, and we quote it when you ask.
Not sure which one fits?
Describe the business in a few sentences and we will tell you which plan it is and what it would cost.
Send an enquiry