Property management answering service: tenant calls answered at any hour, triaged by your rules

The heating fails on a Sunday. A tenant locks themselves out at midnight. Water comes through a ceiling into the unit below at 2 a.m. Somebody’s smoke alarm chirps for three days and they call about it at eleven at night because that’s when it wakes them.

All of those reach the same phone number, and only some of them justify calling anyone. Without a first line, either your manager takes them all personally or the after-hours number becomes voicemail — and a habitability complaint left on voicemail is a liability, not an inconvenience.

• Property, building and unit number — always, before anything else
• Tenant name and callback number, and whether they’re the leaseholder
• What’s wrong, in their words
• Whether it’s active — water running, no heat, no power, a door that won’t lock
• How long it’s been going on
• Whether entry is permitted if nobody’s home, and whether there are pets
• Whether they’ve reported it before

The unit number and the entry permission are the two fields that decide whether a vendor’s trip is useful.

You write the line; we don’t move it. A version most portfolios recognize:

Dispatch now — no heat below your temperature threshold, no water, sewage backup, active flooding, no power to a unit, a fire or gas concern (with the caller told to leave and call 911 or the utility first), a broken exterior door or lock, anything affecting habitability.

Work order for the next business day — appliances, a dripping faucet, a running toilet, a light fixture, cosmetic damage, noise complaints, parking, lease and rent questions.

Noise complaints and lockouts are the two that generate the most argument at 1 a.m., which is why your policy on both is written down word for word.

For calls that clear the bar we work your list in order — the on-call maintenance tech, then the approved vendor for that trade and that property, then the manager — logging every attempt with a timestamp. The vendor gets the address, the unit and the problem before they call the tenant.

Approved vendor lists can differ per property, and updating them is a change in the portal. How escalation works.

Owner calls get their own routing and never sit in the tenant queue. Leasing enquiries are captured with the property, the move-in date and the caller’s requirements — and booked for a showing if you allow it.

Same number, same receptionist, 24/7/365. In most portfolios it’s the difference between a tenant explaining a problem accurately at midnight and a vendor arriving for the wrong thing. How bilingual reception works.

One answered call = one billable call, whatever we do on it, dispatch attempts included, with no night or holiday surcharge. Plans from $119 to $649; portfolios with per-property routing and vendor lists are Custom Operations. Full pricing.