AI answering machine detection
AI answering machine detection, built and run on our own servers
Our own engine listens to the first seconds of each answered call it is handed and decides: a person is passed to your reps, a machine goes to the hang-up. No outside AI service in the loop. From October 19 to October 29, 2026 it judged 529,674 answered calls on our floor dialer.
Outside the US? The booking form takes international phone numbers.
- Test call 1"Hello?" then quietPERSONcause: clear hello
- Test call 2"...not available, leave a message after the tone"MACHINEcause: voicemail words
- Test call 3"Record your name and reason for calling"SCREENERcause: phone call screening
- Test call 4(fax tone)MACHINEcause: fax tone
Staged example: test calls. The causes follow the ones our engine writes to the dialer's log.
Built by a team that has built 300+ call centers
- 15 yearsbuilding call centers
- 300+call centers built
- Double or tripleconversions on the floors we build
- 7-12%live answer rates on our floors, some at 13-14%
- About 70%fewer machines reaching agents
Source: Jason Shouldice, CEO, October 2026.
What happens on a live call
From pick-up to person or machine
Each call it judges goes through the same steps. Floor managers call this AMD detection; here is what ours does.
Someone, or something, picks up
The dialer hands the answered call to our engine, and it listens from the moment of answer.
A clear hello goes straight through
A short "Hello?" followed by a pause is a person. That call goes to a rep without waiting for the rest of the checks.
Everything else gets a closer listen
Three checks run together on the first seconds of audio: a model trained on the sound of the call, our own speech-to-text listening for voicemail words like "leave a message", and a second model that weighs both. Tones, fax lines and a dead-quiet line are caught too.
Phone screeners are named, not lumped in
A phone's call-screening assistant ("record your name and reason for calling") is recognised from its own words, so you can see those calls apart from voicemail.
Person to a rep, machine to the hang-up
A person is passed to your reps. A machine is hung up and the lead goes back in line under your campaign's own redial rules.
When in doubt, a person gets the call
Too little audio, or a model that fails, means the call is treated as a person and goes to a rep. If our engine cannot answer in time, the dialer's own built-in check takes over for that call.
The work it does
Answered calls judged on our floor dialer
- 529,674answered calls judged on our floor dialer in 9 weekdays, October 19 to October 29, 2026Source: CCDocs dialer answering-machine log, floor dialer, October 19 to October 29, 2026.
- 85,070calls judged on the busiest of those weekdays; 40,289 on the quietestSource: CCDocs dialer answering-machine log, floor dialer, October 19 to October 29, 2026.
- 1 in 6calls our check marked as a machine on October 15, 2026 were really a phone's call screener (17.6% of a held-out 3,036)Source: CCDocs check of 10,000 answering-machine calls on 3 outbound campaigns, October 15, 2026.
Machines reaching agents cut by about 70% on the floors we build and run, so your reps spend their hours talking to people. Source: Jason Shouldice, CEO, October 2026.
What a floor loses with a bad detector
Two ways to lose, on every answered call
A machine reaches your rep
Your rep listens to a voicemail greeting instead of talking to someone. Multiply that by every rep, every hour.
A person is treated as a machine
A lead you paid for picks up, hears nothing, and the line goes dead. Nobody on your floor ever knows it happened.
A detector has to get both right, and you should be able to see why it decided. Ours writes a cause for each call it judges.
Tell us your dialer and we will show you how the engine plugs in.
Book a discovery callThe fair questions
Before you say yes
"Where does my call audio go?"
To our engine on our own servers. The speech-to-text and the models run there, with no outside AI company in the loop.
"What if your engine goes down?"
The dialer's own built-in check takes over for those calls, so the floor keeps dialing while our engine is slow or away.
"I need to see the decisions."
Each call it judges gets a cause in the dialer's log. You can pull any day and see what was heard and why.
"My dialer is not VICIdial."
Other dialers can call the engine over the internet: send the first seconds of audio, get back person or machine.
What you need
What it needs
- The first seconds of the call. It decides from the audio after pick-up, so the person hears a short wait while it listens.
- English voicemail words. Its speech-to-text listens for English voicemail phrases.
- No voicemail drop. A machine is hung up, not left a message.
On top of it: AI Call Screener answers phone screeners, and AI Auto Opener greets the person by first name once the engine says person.
Questions we get
FAQ
Which dialer does it work with?
It runs inside VICIdial on our floor. Other dialers can use it over the internet: the dialer sends the first seconds of audio and gets back person or machine.
Does it use an outside AI service?
No. The models and the speech-to-text run on our own servers. The call audio is not sent to an outside AI company.
What happens when it is not sure?
Too little audio, or a model that fails, means the call goes to a rep as a person.
What if the engine is down?
The dialer's own built-in check takes over for those calls.
Does it leave voicemail messages?
No. A machine is hung up and the lead is dialed again under your campaign's rules.
Does it know phone call screeners?
Yes. It recognises a phone's call-screening assistant from its own words. On October 15, 2026, about 1 in 6 calls our check had marked as a machine was really one of these; telling them apart is what the screener check is for.
Can I see why it decided?
Each call it judges is written to the dialer's log with its cause: clear hello, voicemail words, tone, silence, screener and so on.
How much can it handle?
On our floor dialer it judged between 40,289 and 85,070 answered calls a weekday from October 19 to October 29, 2026.
Works with
Works with the rest of our AI products
- AI Call Center ManagerSarah listens to every call, coaches each rep in private and answers their questions in Slack.
- AI Call AgentTina talks with a person in real time and both can talk at once, like a real call.
- AI Auto DispoThe robot listens to the customer side of each call and sets the result code in the dialer.
- AI Auto OpenerA short greeting with the lead's first name once our machine check hears a person, while your rep comes on.
- AI Call ScreenerWhen a phone's call-screening assistant answers, it answers back and waits for the person.
Put our detector on your dialer
Book a discovery call. Tell us your dialer and your campaigns, and we will show you how the engine plugs in and what it writes for each call it judges.
Book a discovery callInternational phone numbers work on the booking form.