Every business has a version of the same list. The aged receivables report open in Xero, three or four names sitting well past due, and a fortnight of good intentions about ringing them.
You do not ring. It is awkward, you are on a job, and chasing money off someone you actually like is nobody's idea of a good afternoon. So another statement goes out by email and lands in an inbox next to the last one.
Talkify now connects to Xero. Your AI phone agent recognises who is calling from your Xero contacts and answers what they owe. And it does the part owners never get around to: it rings the overdue accounts for you.
Getting connected
Connect your Xero from the Integrations screen. You sign in with your normal Xero login and pick which organisation to share. There is no API key to hunt down and nothing to paste.
On the phone, it knows the account
- It knows who is ringing. The caller's number is matched to your Xero contacts, so the agent greets them by name instead of asking who is calling.
- It answers "what do I owe". The total owing, how much of it is overdue, and when it was due, read straight off your approved invoices in Xero.
- It answers "is that one paid". If you allow it, the agent confirms a specific invoice by number, its amount and its due date.
- It can mention an overdue amount itself. Optional, and only after it has dealt with what the customer actually rang about.
You decide how much it says. Totals only is the safer setting, where the agent talks about the balance but never reads out individual invoices. Invoice by invoice is there when your customers expect that level of detail.
"I never got the invoice"
This is the answer you hear more than any other, and often enough it is true. The invoice went to an old address, or to someone who has left, or straight to junk. So the agent settles it while the customer is still on the phone.
It reads back the email address you hold for them in Xero, waits for a yes, and emails them the real invoice PDF from your Xero. If they give a different address it repeats it back to check, sends it there, and records where it went. If you switch it on, it can text them a secure link to the invoice instead, which suits the people who never open email.
A caller can only ever be sent an invoice from their own account, and only when we have recognised them from the number they rang in on. Emailed copies are free. Texted ones cost a few cents.
It only ever discusses an account with someone it recognises. The customer has to be ringing from a number that matches a contact in your Xero. Nobody can talk their way in by quoting a name or an invoice number, and the agent cannot change anything in your Xero or take a payment.
The calls that get you paid
Reminders by email are easy to send and easy to ignore. A polite phone call is the thing that actually moves an invoice, and it is the thing owners never get around to.
So Talkify makes it automatic. You set the rule once, and your agent rings the overdue accounts using the same outbound calling that already runs surveys and follow ups for hundreds of NZ businesses.
The settings are yours, not ours:
| You control | What that means |
|---|---|
| Days past due | How late an invoice has to be before anyone gets a call |
| The call list | You see exactly who is due to be rung, and take anyone off it before it dials |
| The wording | Write what the agent says in your own voice, firm or friendly, it is your relationship |
| How often | One reminder, or a gentle follow up, with a cap so nobody gets pestered |
| Who hears about it | An accounts inbox of your choosing, separate from your normal notifications |
Then it reports back. Every call is logged as a note on that invoice in Xero, including anything the customer promised. "Paying Friday" is written on the invoice, not lost in someone's memory. If they say they would rather talk to a person, or they query the bill, the agent stops chasing and emails your accounts inbox so a human picks it up.
The point is not to be tougher on your customers. It is to make sure the reminder actually happens while you are under a house with a torch in your teeth.
It is a reminder, not a debt collector
Most late invoices in New Zealand are not people refusing to pay. They are people who forgot, or whose own customer has not paid them yet. A short, polite call that says the invoice is a fortnight overdue and asks when suits gets most of them sorted, and it keeps a customer you would like to keep.
That is the tone we have built for. The agent is calm, it takes no for an answer, and it hands anything sensitive straight to your team. If a call needs a hard conversation, it should be you having it, with the facts already written on the invoice.
What it costs
The Xero integration is $10 a month on top of your Talkify plan. The calls it makes are 50c a minute.
An overdue reminder call runs well under a minute most of the time. Put that next to the invoice it recovers, or next to an hour of your evening spent working up to the phone call, and the maths is not a close one.
Switch it on
If you run your books in Xero, this takes a couple of minutes to connect and it starts working on the accounts you have been meaning to chase.
See how outbound calling works, check pricing, hear an agent live, or get in touch and we will connect your Xero.
Stop reading. Talk to it.
Hear one of our agents on the phone, or get a free demo agent on your own NZ number. No card needed.