Industries Plumbers
Business texting and a shared inbox for plumbers
A plumber cannot answer the phone with both hands inside a vanity unit and a shut-off valve half-turned. So the call rings out, the customer with the burst pipe rings the next name on Google, and you never even knew the job existed. HiveThread turns those calls into texts that wait in one shared inbox: the office, your apprentice, or you between jobs picks them up and replies, and the work stays yours.
Most plumbing enquiries now start as a text or a photo of a dripping trap, not a voicemail. Someone messages your Facebook page about a hot-water system, another types "no water pressure upstairs" into your website chat, a regular texts your mobile asking when you are coming. HiveThread lands all of it in one place, drafts a reply in your voice from your own pricing and FAQs, and keeps the full history of every property and job beside the conversation.
Sound familiar?
You physically cannot answer the phone on the tools
Under a sink, up in a roof cavity, or halfway through a mains changeover, you are not stopping to take a call, and the caller with a leaking hot-water unit is not leaving a voicemail. They ring the next plumber. A text is different: "how much to replace a kitchen mixer?" arrives in writing, sits in the inbox, and gets answered the moment you are back in the van instead of vanishing the second the phone stops ringing.
After-hours emergencies get lost until morning
A burst pipe at 9pm floods a laundry, and the panicked homeowner tries three plumbers before someone picks up. If their message lands in a shared inbox with a push notification, whoever is on call sees it, replies "on my way, 40 minutes", and wins a premium job, while the mate who let it hit voicemail is asleep. The written thread also records exactly what was said before you rolled up the driveway.
Quoting by photo turns into a mess of half-lost threads
Customers text a photo of the corroded valve, the model sticker on the hot-water tank, or the puddle under the dishwasher. That is gold for quoting without a site visit, but only if the photo, the address and your reply all stay together. When it is scattered across a personal mobile, a Facebook chat and a note on the dash, the follow-up quote never gets sent and the job goes cold.
A day with HiveThread
Thursday, 7:50am: mixer tap job in Reservoir
Dave is on his knees under a bathroom vanity replacing a mixer when his phone starts ringing in his pocket. He lets it go. In the old days a rung-out call was a coin toss: new job or a wrong number he would never know. Today the customer does what most people do next: texts the business number instead. By the time Dave stands up there is a message in the HiveThread inbox: a photo of a rusted-through gate valve and "can you look at this today, water is dripping into the cabinet."
The office had already opened the same inbox on the desktop. The AI has drafted a reply in the business voice: a rough price range for a valve replacement, a note that Dave is in the area, and two windows that afternoon. Reception reads it, adds "bring the quarter-turn valves from the van stock", and sends. The customer books the 2pm slot before Dave has packed up the mixer job.
At lunch a burst-pipe message comes in from a Facebook page enquiry: a landlord with a tenant standing in a flooded kitchen. It is tagged "urgent", assigned to Dave with a private note holding the property manager's after-hours number, and he can see the whole thread the moment he opens the van door. No repeating the story, no lost address, no callback tag on the dashboard that never gets actioned.
How plumbing business use HiveThread
Quote from a photo without a wasted site visit
Customers text you a picture of the leaking flexi hose, the sticker on the hot-water system, or the split under the gully trap. The photo, the address and your reply all sit in one thread, so you can price a straightforward job from the van and only drive out when it is worth the trip. Saved replies handle the "can you send a photo of the fault and your suburb?" ask so nothing stalls while you are on the tools.
Handle after-hours call-outs without missing the premium jobs
When a pipe bursts after dinner, the homeowner texts instead of leaving a voicemail nobody hears until morning. Push notifications on the mobile app put the message in front of whoever is on call, so they can reply "on the way, 45 minutes" and lock in the emergency job. The full written thread means the after-hours plumber rolls up already knowing the address, the problem and what was promised.
Turn website and Facebook enquiries into booked work
The chat widget on your website turns "how much to replace a hot-water system?" into an SMS conversation that follows the visitor onto their phone, where they actually book instead of abandoning a contact form. Facebook and Instagram messages about blocked drains or bathroom renos land in the same inbox as your texts, so a lead never sits unseen on a page nobody logs into during the day.
Keep the whole crew on the same page for every property
Assign the Reservoir job to the apprentice, leave a private note that the shut-off is behind the garden bed, and tag the contact "regular, strata". Whoever picks up the next message about that address sees the entire history: past jobs, what was quoted, what was fitted. No more relying on one person's memory or a scribble on a docket that is already in the bin.
The features doing the work
One inbox for the van, the office and the on-call phone
Texts, website chat, Facebook and Instagram messages all land in a single shared inbox. The office, the boss and the crew on the tools see the same queue, so no enquiry rots on a personal phone nobody else can reach.
Replies drafted in your voice while you are on a job
The AI learns your pricing, your service area and your FAQs from your website, then drafts answers about call-out fees, hot-water swaps and blocked drains. You read it, tweak it, and send. Every word to a customer is still yours.
Push notifications so emergencies never slip
The iOS and Android apps buzz the on-call phone the moment an after-hours message lands, so a burst-pipe job gets a reply in minutes instead of being found at 7am when the customer has already booked someone else.
Every property and past job beside the reply
Photos of the fault, the address, past work and private notes like "isolation valve behind the garden bed" sit next to the conversation, so anyone answering knows the property without asking the customer to explain it twice.
Instant answers to the questions you get daily
Call-out fees, service suburbs, "send me a photo and your address" and after-hours rates are the same twenty questions every week. Saved replies fire them off in a tap so a lead is never left waiting while you are under a house.
Frequently asked questions
Can the office and the plumbers on the tools share one number?
Yes. Every text to your HiveThread number lands in one shared inbox that the office, the on-call phone and the crew can all see. Assignments, private notes and typing indicators make it clear who is handling which job, so nothing is answered twice or left sitting while everyone assumes someone else has it.
Will the AI reply to customers on its own?
No. HiveThread is not a chatbot. The AI drafts a suggested reply from your own pricing and FAQs, and a human reads, edits and sends it. For quoting a call-out or an emergency job, that review step is exactly what you want before a price or a promise goes out to a customer.
Can customers send photos of the problem?
Yes. Customers can text photos of the leaking valve, the hot-water sticker or the puddle under the sink, and they land right in the conversation with the address and your reply. It lets you rough-price a lot of jobs from the van and only drive out for a site visit when it is genuinely needed.
What happens to after-hours emergency messages?
They land in the same inbox with a push notification to the on-call phone through the iOS or Android app. Whoever is rostered sees the burst-pipe message straight away, can reply with an ETA, and rolls up already knowing the address and the problem, instead of the job dying in a voicemail nobody checks until morning.
How long does it take to get going?
Most plumbing businesses are answering messages the same day. Connect a number, link your Facebook and Instagram pages, drop the chat widget on your website, and invite the office and the crew. There is no new hardware and nothing to install in the van. It works from the apps you already carry.
Stop losing jobs to the plumber who answered first
Available now in Australia, the US and Canada.
Give every call-out, photo and enquiry one place to land and a crew that can actually reply. Plans from $49/mo AUD ($25/mo USD).