Ask Eli

Eli is the assistant built into Dialhop, and the receptionist that answers your shop's phone; see Calls. It answers "how do I" questions from these help pages, and questions about your own business, such as your hours, your services, and your recent calls, from your own records. It reads, and the one thing it changes is your Receptionist settings, on a card you confirm. It can also pass a note on to the Dialhop team for you; see Send feedback.

Ask Eli a question

1. Press Ask Eli at the top of any screen, or press Cmd+J (Ctrl+J on Windows). The panel opens down the side.
2. Type your question and press Enter, or pick one of the suggestions.
3. Eli answers in a few lines. When the answer comes from a help page, it links the page.

Press Cmd+J again, or the Close button, to put the panel away. The conversation stays while the panel is closed.

Choose where Eli sits

1. Open Eli, then press Layout at the top of the panel.
2. Pick Sidebar to keep Eli in a column down the side, beside the screen you're on, or Floating to have it open as a card over the corner of the screen, so the page keeps its full width.

With Floating, a round Eli button sits in the bottom corner of every screen: press it to open Eli and again to put it away. Ask Eli and Cmd+J still work too. Dialhop remembers your choice. On a phone, Eli always opens over the whole screen.

Start a new conversation

Press New conversation at the top of the panel. The previous one is not kept.

What Eli can see

Eli sees your sources on the Knowledge screen, and the hours, days off, and services it read from them, your shop's details and address from Settings, your calls, and your Customers. It sees no other business's records. To change what Eli knows, change a source on Knowledge; Eli itself changes nothing there.

To check what callers are told, ask Eli: "What hours are you giving callers?" or "Which services can callers book?" Eli answers from what it read, and says which source it's going by.

Change a Receptionist setting by asking Eli

1. Press Ask Eli at the top of any screen.
2. Say what you want in plain words: "email me instead of calling", "move the day-before reminder to 6", "put callers through to 804 555 0123", "two cars at a time".
3. Eli shows a card, Change these settings?, listing each setting with its new value and one line on what changes. Press Apply, or Not now to leave things as they are.

Eli can change the greeting, Opens in, Also greet in, Pronunciation, Put callers through to, When a caller needs you, how many appointments start at once, the address your messages are emailed to, whether Eli answers texts, and the reminders by text: on or off, the day-before time, and the hours-before notice. It changes nothing else, and nothing until you press Apply. A change that can't be made says why on the card: Call me first needs a transfer number, and reminders need texting set up on your number.