Remi is an AI receptionist for Durban GPs, dentists, specialists and allied-health practices. It answers every call 24/7, books and reschedules into Cliniko, Nookal or Google Calendar, and keeps working through the December, Easter and July surges when the coast fills up and your front desk is stretched thinnest.
The Durban-specific problem
Durban practices do not follow a normal annual rhythm. They follow Gauteng's. December and January, the Easter weekend, and the July school holidays each bring a wave of inland visitors down to the coast — and with them a spike in the calls a holidaymaker makes: a repeat script left at home, a child with an ear infection, a dentist for a chipped tooth, a same-day GP slot.
Three surges a year, each landing on a front desk that is either short-staffed for the holidays or already at capacity with your regular patients. Remi absorbs the overflow without a temp, a handover or a training week, and costs the same in July as it does in February.
The growth corridor
The northern corridor from Umhlanga through La Lucia to Ballito has been one of the fastest-growing residential and commercial areas in the country, and new practices keep opening to serve it. If you are establishing rooms there, every call is a patient deciding whether you are their practice — and a phone that rings out during setup is a relationship that never starts. Remi gives a new practice a front desk from day one, at a fraction of what hiring one costs before the books are full.
On the phone
Remi answers in English and Afrikaans with a natural South African voice, and follows whichever language the caller opens in.
The honest caveat, and it matters more in KwaZulu-Natal than anywhere else we operate: Remi does not speak isiZulu on voice. isiZulu is the dominant home language in this province. If a significant share of your patients phone in isiZulu, Remi is not the right fit for your front desk yet — we would rather say that now than sell you something that frustrates your patients.
The other coastal reality
A patient who lives down the road knows you close at 16:30. A family from Johannesburg staying in Umhlanga for a week does not — they phone at 19:00 because that is when the child's temperature went up. Remi answers, triages against the rules you set, books them into the next available slot or tells them plainly to go to an emergency room. Either way they get a human-sounding answer instead of a beep.
Across the city
Remi runs on your existing number, so there is nothing to install and nobody to let in. Practices we speak to sit right across Durban:
Practice-ready
Remi runs alongside your booking system — no rip-and-replace — and treats patient information the way a healthcare practice has to.
Pricing
R2,900/mo
vs R10,800/mo for a full-time medical receptionist who still goes home at 5
Weighing this against a hire? See the full cost comparison →
See it on your line
Leave your details and we'll set up a live demo on your own practice number, so you can hear the latency and voice quality yourself — no obligation.
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Tap “Talk to Remi” in the corner to have a live conversation with it right now — then put it on your practice number in a couple of days.
Book a free demoOr start your trial — from R2,900/mo
Questions
December and January, Easter and the July school holidays each bring a wave of inland visitors to the coast, and with them a spike in calls — repeat scripts, sick children, same-day GP and dentist slots. Those weeks land on a front desk that is either short-staffed for the holidays or already full with regulars. Remi absorbs the overflow without a temp or a training week, and costs the same in July as in February.
No. Remi handles English and Afrikaans on voice, and isiZulu is the dominant home language in KwaZulu-Natal. This is the most significant limitation for a Durban practice, and if a large share of your patients phone in isiZulu then Remi is not the right fit for your front desk yet. It is on the roadmap, not in the product.
Usually more so, not less. A new practice cannot justify a full-time front desk before the books are full, but that is exactly the period when every unanswered call is a patient deciding you are not their practice. Remi gives you a phone that always gets answered from day one, at R2,900/month rather than a salary.
Yes, and it does it without pretending to be a doctor. Remi answers, applies the rules you set, and either books the next available slot or tells the caller plainly to go to an emergency room. Anything clinical or unusual is escalated rather than guessed at.
Remi · Standard is R2,900/month including 1,000 talk-minutes, then R1.85/min. Indeed puts the average South African medical receptionist at R10,838/month across 103 reported salaries, before UIF, leave cover and recruitment. There is a free 1-week trial.
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