Prices and care types

The assistant only ever says a price you have published. It says every price as a starting price, in wording you approve, and it never works one out for itself.

Prices are set up in three layers:

Dated offers are covered in Specials and price approval. To take prices from your CRM instead of typing them, see CRM price sync. Neither is needed to get started.

Who can do what#

Set up your care types#

Do this once for the whole account. Each community then decides which ones it offers and at what price.

1. Open Care types and options

   Go to Pricing in the left-hand menu and open the Care types and options tab.

   

2. Add the option sets that change a price

   An option set is a list of choices that changes a price, such as Apartment (Studio, One bedroom) or Care level (Care level 1, Care level 2). Type a name under New option set and press Add, then add its choices under Add to Apartment.

   Removing an option archives it. Communities that priced it keep their published prices until they next change them.

3. Add each care type

   Press Add a care type and fill in:

   Field	What to put
   Name	What callers and your team call it: "Assisted living".
   How the agent says it (optional)	Only if the name reads badly out loud.
   Other words callers use	Separated by commas: "AL, assisted, help with care". The assistant hears these as this care type.
   What it is	One or two sentences the assistant may use to explain it.
   Kind	Service, Add-on or Fee. Add-ons and fees are priced, but the assistant never offers them as something you have.
   Charged	A month, a day, a night, a week, a visit, an hour, or one time.
   For	One person, or A second person for a second-occupant price.
   Can be priced by (up to two option sets)	For example Apartment and Care level. Each community chooses whether to use them.

   You should see it in the Care types table.

Care types only one community has#

With Each community may add care types only it offers on (it is on by default), a community can add its own from its Pricing tab with Add a care type only this community offers. It gets a name and how it is charged, and shows under Only at this community.

Pricing settings#

The Pricing settings card at the top of the tab. Only the account owner can change these.

Give a community its prices#

Each community has its own price book: which care types it offers, how each is priced, and the starting prices. Open Communities, pick a community, and go to its Pricing tab.

1. Turn on what this community offers

   Each care type has a switch: Offered here or Not offered here. A new community offers nothing until you turn it on, so it never quotes something nobody has checked.

2. Choose how it is priced

   How it is priced offers One price, or by each option set the care type allows, or by both: By apartment and care level, say. A smaller community can charge one price for assisted living while a larger one prices every apartment and care level.

   

3. Type the starting prices

   Type an amount such as 4850 (a dollar sign, commas and cents are fine too), or on request. Clear a box and that combination is not offered here.

   Each price is the lowest a caller could pay for it. The card shows the care type's starting price, and the top of the tab shows the community's, worked out from the prices you typed. Fees and add-ons are left out of the community's starting price.

4. Add extra words, or hide a price (optional)

   The More button next to a price opens three settings for it.

   

   Setting	What it does
   Extra words after the price	Said after the price: "includes three meals a day". No numbers here: prices go in the price.
   Hide this price from callers	Your team sees it; the assistant says the team will go over it instead.
   Note for your team	Never said.

5. Publish

   In the Publish card, add a note under What changed (optional) and press Publish prices.

   You should see: Prices published. The agent quotes them from now on.

   Note

   If something goes wrong. Anything that stops the prices publishing is listed under Fix these before publishing, such as an offered care type with no price. Save without publishing keeps your work as a draft; Discard changes goes back to what was published last.

Nothing you type reaches callers until it is published. Calls always use the published prices, and each call records the version it used.

Schedule a price change#

Enter a date under Takes effect (optional) and the button becomes Schedule prices. The assistant keeps quoting today's prices until that moment, in the community's own time zone, then switches on its own. Good for a January rate increase.

The tab shows Version 2 takes effect …, with Cancel it until the date arrives. A community has one scheduled change at a time.

Go back to an earlier version#

Published versions lists every version, newest first, with its note. Roll back publishes a copy of an old version as a new one, so nothing is lost.

Keep prices current#

A price nobody has changed or confirmed within Review prices every days is marked with a clock in the matrix, and the community's Pricing tab says how many care types need a look. When they are still right, press Still correct, then publish. Nothing about the price changes; it is simply marked as checked.

Prices kept by a CRM price sync are confirmed by every sync, so they never need this.

Every community at once: the pricing matrix#

Pricing → Prices shows every community against every care type, so you can review and change the whole account in one place. Community managers see only their own communities.

A clock next to a price means it is due for review. CRM means the price comes from your CRM.

Change prices in place#

Double-click a price that is one figure, or select it and start typing: 4850, on request, or clear it to stop offering it there. Press Enter to keep it. A care type priced by option opens its editor instead, the same one as on the Pricing tab.

Every change waits in the page until you save or publish it, and moving between the matrix and a care type's view keeps them.

One care type at every community#

Click a care type's name at the top of its column to see it at every community, with a column for every option. This is the easiest way to work through a full apartment and care level grid.

A community that prices it more simply shows how, with Price by every option to switch it over.

Find what you need#

Change many prices at once#

Tick the communities you want (or none, for every community shown) and press Change many prices. Choose the care types (none ticked means all of them), Change by a percentage or an amount (use a minus sign to lower), and how to Round. Press Change prices.

"On request" prices and prices your CRM keeps stay as they are.

Export and import a CSV#

Export CSV downloads the prices shown, one row per price, with these columns:

Edit it in a spreadsheet and bring it back with Import CSV. Communities are matched by ID, then by exact name. You see how many prices were read and each row that was skipped, with the reason. An import never publishes: the prices become unsaved changes you review and publish like any other. Specials are not in the file.

Review and publish#

When you are done, press Review and publish. The count on the button is how many communities changed.

Write one note and, if you like, one date for the lot. Each community is published as its own version. If any community has a problem, nothing is published and the dialog says which one and why.

Save without publishing keeps the changes as drafts. Discard changes throws every unpublished change away.

What the assistant says#

1. Only your published starting prices

   "Assisted living starts at $4,850 a month." The figure comes from the price book and is said by our own code, in your wording. The assistant chooses which price answers the question; it never writes the number.

2. The lowest first, then narrower

   Asked "how much is assisted living?", it gives the starting price and asks which apartment or care level the caller has in mind. Asked about a studio at care level 2, it gives that price.

3. Without asking twice

   If a question already recorded the caller's answer, such as a Care type question that takes its choices from your prices, a price question uses it. "How much is a studio?" from a caller who said assisted living gets the assisted living studio price.

4. Never a figure you did not publish

   It never gives a top price, a range, a total of several charges, or a price worked out from a special. It never quotes another community's price. A hidden price, or one marked on request, gets the "team will go over pricing" line. A sentence with any other figure is stopped before it is spoken.

5. Plainly when you do not offer it

   Asked about something this community does not offer, it says so. What follows is up to you: see When a community does not offer something.

How prices are said#

The wording is on the playbook's Guardrails tab, under How prices are said.

The care type, options, amount and "a month" are inserted with the detail pills. A line cannot contain a number of its own: the figures only ever come from your prices. The special lines and When to mention specials are covered in Specials.

Each line can be reworded for one community on its Customizations tab. To stop that, lock How prices are said on the playbook's Advanced tab.

When a community does not offer something#

A caller asks Lakeview about memory care, and Lakeview does not offer it. The assistant always says so. Other communities, under How prices are said, decides what comes next:

The nearby communities come from each community's profile, under Nearby communities, in the order you list them (up to ten; the first is named first).

Prices elsewhere in your playbook#

The brief and other wording can borrow a community's prices with these details:

For a community with a long price list, these carry each care type's starting price only, and the assistant looks up the rest when a caller asks. They cannot be used inside the pricing lines themselves.

Prices also appear in two more places, both optional:

• Questions: a question can take its choices from each community's prices. See Questions and flows.
• The follow-up page: a Pricing section. See Follow-up page.

Pricing insights#

Pricing → Insights shows what callers asked about cost, for the last 7, 30 or 90 days.

Price points are retired#

Communities used to hold prices as Price points on their profile. When price books arrived, each community's price points were copied into a draft price book: a care type for each label, with the starting price read from wording like "starts at $4,200 a month", and "on request" where it could not be read (the original words are kept in the price's note for your team).

Price points are now retired: the profile no longer shows them and they can no longer be changed. Until a community publishes its first price book, the assistant keeps saying its old price points as they were, so nothing your callers hear changes until you have looked at the drafted prices. Once the price book is published, its prices are the only ones the assistant says. A price point that states an offer is not said: offers are specials. The community's Pricing tab says so, and the publish checklist names any community still on its old price points.

To move over, open Pricing → Prices, check each community's drafted prices, and press Review and publish to publish them all at once.

What good looks like#

• Every community offers exactly what it really offers, and nothing else is switched on.
• Nothing in the matrix is marked due for review.
• The care types have the words callers really use under Other words callers use.
• A test call asking "how much is assisted living?" gets your published starting price, in your wording, and a follow-up question about which apartment.

Next: Specials and price approval.