Last updated: July 2026
AI Phone Answering Service takes privacy seriously and handles personal information openly and carefully. This policy explains what we collect and why, whether you are a client of ours, a visitor to this site, or someone who has rung a business that uses our service.
1. About Us
AI Phone Answering Service is a New Zealand provider of AI phone answering and virtual reception. We answer inbound calls for client businesses, take messages, book appointments and route calls.
2. Two Groups This Covers
Because our service sits between a business and its callers, this policy speaks to both. Clients are the businesses that hire us to answer their phones. Callers are members of the public who phone one of those businesses. If you reached an AI receptionist when you called a company, this is what happens to the information in that call.
3. What We Collect From Callers
When you call a business we answer for, we may capture your name and number, what you say during the call, an audio recording and written transcript of it, any details you give such as an address or a preferred appointment time, and the time and length of the call. All of this exists so the business you rang can help you, book you in, or call you back.
4. Recording and Transcription
Calls we handle are recorded and turned into text, because that is how the messages, bookings and summaries the business relies on get produced. Callers are told the call is recorded. If you would rather not be recorded, you can hang up and reach the business another way, for instance by email or in person. Recordings and transcripts count as personal information under the Privacy Act 2020.
5. What We Collect From Clients and Visitors
Clients give us their name, business name, contact details and information about their services, prices, hours and call handling needs. When you browse this website we also automatically log technical basics such as your IP address, device and browser, the pages you view, and how you arrived, using standard analytics tools.
6. Why We Use It
We use personal information to answer calls and pass on the resulting messages, bookings and enquiries, to run and improve the accuracy of the agent, to respond to and deliver work for clients, to keep in touch about projects and support, and to meet our legal and security obligations. We never sell it.
7. Who Controls a Caller’s Information
When we answer a call for a client, that client decides why the information is held and what becomes of it. We handle it for them, under our agreement. To have your details corrected or removed, contact us and we will help, and you are also free to approach the business you called directly.
8. Providers We Rely On
Running the service takes specialist telephony, speech recognition, speech synthesis and AI language providers, some of which process data outside New Zealand. Where information goes offshore we take reasonable steps to keep it protected to New Zealand standards, as the Privacy Act 2020 requires. We may also share information with hosting and analytics providers, professional advisers, or authorities where the law demands it.
9. AI and Your Data
Client and caller data is used only to run and improve the agreed service. We do not repurpose it, and we do not train public AI models on identifiable client or caller data. Only authorised people can access it.
10. Cookies
This site may use cookies and similar tools to see how visitors move through it and to measure content. Your browser settings let you control them, though turning them off may affect how parts of the site work.
11. Keeping It Safe
We take reasonable measures to guard personal information against loss, misuse, unauthorised access and unwanted disclosure, storing it on secure systems with access controls suited to how sensitive it is.
12. How Long We Hold It
We keep information only as long as the purpose or the law requires. Call recordings and transcripts are held for the period agreed with the client business, then securely deleted or anonymised.
13. Your Rights
Under the Privacy Act 2020 you can ask to see the personal information we hold about you, including recordings and transcripts, ask us to correct it, ask how it is handled, and complain to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner if our response does not satisfy you. We answer requests within the timeframes the Act sets.
14. Changes
We may update this policy as the law, our services or our practices change. The latest version is always here.
15. Contact
AI Phone Answering Service
Email: info@aiphoneansweringservice.co.nz