Thumbs Up started in 2017 as a one-man HVAC company in the Dallas area and is still a small team. Owner Richard Fisher grows mostly through maintenance agreements, but finding who was due for a visit meant going through customers one by one. Now he asks Podium's AI Operator for the next 20 customers due for maintenance and gets the list right away. The AI also answers customer messages and finds duplicate customer records, then fixes them when asked.
Business type: Contractors & home services. Tool used: Podium AI Employee + AI Operator. Result: Podium reports customers get an AI response in 60 seconds and that these AI tasks save the owner more than 15 hours of admin work a month. Since moving to Podium, the company's invoice rate went from 43% to 83% and its collection rate from 39% to 64%; those are for the whole switch, not the AI alone. Reported in Podium's case study.
Source: Podium (Company case study) · Added Tue, Nov 3 · Last updated 2026-11-03
Podium reports customers get an AI response in 60 seconds and that these AI tasks save the owner more than 15 hours of admin work a month. Since moving to Podium, the company's invoice rate went from 43% to 83% and its collection rate from 39% to 64%; those are for the whole switch, not the AI alone. Reported in Podium's case study. (as reported by the source)
Guide: AI answering service for HVAC companies: real examples and how to set one up
Guide: Podium AI for small business: real examples
Thumbs Up started in 2017 as a one-man HVAC company in the Dallas area and is still a small team. Owner Richard Fisher grows mostly through maintenance agreements, but finding who was due for a visit meant going through customers one by one. Now he asks Podium's AI Operator for the next 20 customers due for maintenance and gets the list right away. The AI also answers customer messages and finds duplicate customer records, then fixes them when asked.
Podium AI Employee + AI Operator.
Podium reports customers get an AI response in 60 seconds and that these AI tasks save the owner more than 15 hours of admin work a month. Since moving to Podium, the company's invoice rate went from 43% to 83% and its collection rate from 39% to 64%; those are for the whole switch, not the AI alone. Reported in Podium's case study. (as reported by the source)
Keep your customers and maintenance plans in one system the AI can read. Ask the AI in plain words: 'Who are the next 20 customers due for maintenance?' Use the list to text or call those customers to book a visit.
Answers come only from the source. Questions it doesn't answer are left out.
Our own prompt for copying this setup. Swap in your details. Not quoted from the source.
From my customer list in [system], list the next 20 customers whose maintenance visit is due, with name, phone, last visit date and plan type. Then draft a short, friendly text inviting each one to book.
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