Business Phone Numbers for Plumbers & Heating Engineers

Feature by feature: why SwitchboardFREE works for plumbers and heating engineers

Every SwitchboardFREE account comes with over 40 features. These are the ones that make the biggest difference to plumbers and heating engineers, and why.

Time-of-day routing

If you offer 24-hour cover, the phone has to know who is on call tonight. Set the rota once, with the office and engineers in the day, the evening engineer from 6pm and a different rota at weekends, and after-hours breakdowns ring the right person automatically. Quote requests can go to voicemail overnight, so nobody is woken up to price a bathroom.

Divert calls to your mobile

You cannot answer with both hands under a sink, and you are never at a desk when a boiler fails. Calls to your plumbing business number ring the SwitchboardFREE app on your mobile or divert to any UK phone, so a customer with water through the ceiling reaches you or a colleague, not an empty office.

Ring groups

In the first cold snap, when the heating goes on and boilers start failing, one engineer cannot take every call. Ring every engineer at once for breakdowns so the first free pair of hands picks up, or ring the office first and then the vans in order.

Local and national numbers

A local 01 or 02 number on the van says you are a local firm, and a free-to-call 0800 number works well on emergency adverts for leaks and breakdowns. Both can sit on one account and ring the same mobile, each with its own greeting and opening hours, with extra numbers added through the paid multi-number package.

Voicemail to email

A quote for a new bathroom or a boiler swap can wait, but you still need the details. Voicemails arrive in your inbox with a written transcript, so you can read the address and the job in the van instead of playing audio on a noisy site.

Missed call alerts

Someone with a leaking pipe rings the next plumber on Google within minutes. The caller's number is emailed to you the moment you miss the call, even if they leave no message, so you can ring back before they book someone else.

DepartmentsStandard & Unlimited plans

Breakdowns, servicing and landlord gas safety work all need different handling. A menu such as "press 1 for a breakdown or leak, press 2 for servicing and quotes" sends emergencies to the engineers and routine bookings to whoever runs the diary, each with its own voicemail.

Call queuing

The week the heating goes on, an engaged tone sends a cold customer straight to your competitor. Call queuing holds callers in line, and queue position announcements tell them their place, so they know they are getting through.

Call screening

Landlords and letting agents booking annual gas safety checks and boiler services expect to reach a business. Give that work its own number or menu option, and call screening tells you which number or department was dialled before you are connected, so you answer them like the repeat customers they are.

Music on holdStandard & Unlimited plans

When the office puts a caller on hold to check which engineer is nearest, silence sounds like a dropped call. Music on hold keeps a worried customer on the line on a busy winter morning while you find a slot.

Call recordingPaid add-on

Breakdown callouts often hinge on what was said on the phone: the callout charge, the arrival time, the cost of parts. Call recording lets you play back or download the call, so a disagreement about the price is settled with the facts.

Telephone Answering ServicePaid add-on

When a cold snap brings more calls than your engineers can take, trained receptionists can answer in your business name and pass you the details. Callers speak to a person instead of a voicemail, and you work through the jobs in order.