Voco vs JAM

JAM vs Voco: what each actually costs

JAM is a UK call answering service staffed by human PAs, answering 24/7, with prices starting at £35 a month. Voco is a UK AI receptionist at 29p a minute ex VAT with no monthly fee and no contract. Both publish an entry price, which makes this an unusually straightforward comparison for this market. Checked on 4 September 2026.

What JAM charges

JAM publishes a starting price of £35 a month for its virtual receptionist service and states that its pricing is up front with no hidden fees or unexpected charges. What it does not publish is a full rate card, so what you actually pay at your call volume comes from a quote.

On contract terms JAM is clear, and better than parts of this market: invoices are paid monthly, so you are never tied into a long contract. That is worth knowing, because it is not the norm. Moneypenny, for example, states a three-month minimum on its smaller schemes and a six or twelve-month commitment on larger ones.

What Voco charges

29p a minute ex VAT on pay as you go. No monthly fee, no minimum, no contract. On Voco’s observed data the average billed call runs about 1.9 minutes, so a typical call costs around 55p, and a month in which nobody rings costs nothing.

The comparison that actually matters

£35 a month against 29p a minute is not a like-for-like comparison, and pretending otherwise would be dishonest. £35 buys you a monthly allowance with human PAs behind it; 29p a minute buys you AI with no floor and no ceiling. Which is cheaper depends entirely on your volume, and at some volume JAM wins on unit cost.

The way to settle it is to count last month’s calls and their average length, multiply the minutes by 29p, and put that number next to a quote from JAM at the same volume. Ask them for the per-minute or per-call rate, what the £35 includes, and what happens when you exceed it. If your calls are few and short, or arrive unpredictably, per-minute with no minimum usually wins. If your volume is steady and high, an allowance can beat it.

Where JAM wins

JAM puts people on the phone. It has been doing this for 46 years and says it has handled more than 27 million calls outside regular office hours. If your callers need a person, that experience is the product, and no amount of per-minute arithmetic substitutes for it.

Where Voco wins

No monthly minimum, so a quiet month costs close to nothing. No contract of any kind, so nothing to give notice on. Every call answered at once rather than queued when several people ring together. And one rate at every hour, including weekends and bank holidays.

The honest summary

Choose JAM if you want human PAs, your volume is steady enough to make an allowance work, and you are comfortable getting a quote for the detail.

Choose Voco if you want no monthly fee and no contract, you would rather pay for the seconds you use than an allowance you might not, or you regularly get more calls at once than you have people to answer them. The rate is published on the pay as you go page.

Whoever you shortlist, ask for a per-minute or per-call rate, a monthly minimum, an out-of-hours rate and the notice period, all in writing. The ones that answer quickly tell you something useful about what working with them will be like.