4 min read · updated 2026-10-18
When should a person take over from an AI agent?
Short answer
A person should take over when the question is not in the approved answers, when the customer asks for a human, or when the assistant would have to invent a price, a policy, or an apology. The $150 chat package emails you the enquiry and stops. A defined handoff is part of the $300 booking package. An agent that keeps talking past that line is the one that makes something up.
The loop is a stop rule, not a slogan
“Human in the loop” means a named person gets the conversation at a named moment, with the transcript attached, and the assistant stops. It does not mean a person glances at a dashboard sometime later.
Write the stop list before the build. Complaints, refunds, discounts, anything medical or legal, and any price that is not in the approved answers. If it is not on the list, the assistant does not improvise a kind version of it.
What each package actually does
Basic chat, $150, collects the name and the enquiry and emails you. That is a handoff by inbox. Nobody is taken over live, and no staffed team is sitting behind the widget.
Booking, $300, adds the rules for when to stop, plus the transcript. Voice, $500, escalates out-of-scope calls to a person and alerts you when a write fails. If the quote says “a human always steps in” and the price is the chat package, the human is you, reading email.
Who the person is
The loop fails when “someone” is not a name. Pick the owner before launch: you, the office, or a named inbox that is actually opened. The assistant cannot escalate to a role that does not exist on Tuesday night.
The business owner decides what a qualified lead is and which answer is now wrong. A developer can change the rule. They should not be the only one who knows the rule exists.
What I will not build as the default
I will not build an assistant that transfers every call to a paid answering seat, and I will not build one that never transfers. The default is narrow answers, then a person. Live takeover by a rotating team is an operation you staff. It is not included in a fixed package.
This is what I do: AI Agents & Voice Assistants — three packages from $150.
