ISSUE #3 · SCEPTICAL ABOUT AI? SO ARE WE. · 3 MIN READ
Morning.
So Google's AI will now book a restaurant table or order the shopping while you're out at a job. Unless you're in the UK, that is.
I haven't tried it yet, for reasons that'll become clear...
01 · THE BIG ONE
Gemini now works while you're away. Not here
What happened: on 13 October Google added a "tasks" switch to the Gemini app. Flick it and, in Google's words, "Gemini can work for you even when you're not at your computer". It plugs into 40-odd apps, from grocery deliveries to Shopify.
The UK catch: it's for the paid AI Pro and Ultra plans (AI Pro is about £15 ($19.99) a month in the US). But Google's help page lists the UK as one of the places it doesn't work. It doesn't work on work or school Google accounts either.
The bit nobody's reading: you can also schedule tasks to run on their own, and the same help page says "If a schedule runs when you are offline, you may not be able to stop Gemini from completing an unintended action." So a job you set up on Monday can go wrong on Thursday while you're up a ladder.
THE SMALL PRINT VERDICT
Wait and see.
You can't have it yet. When it does land, I'd want it on a work account with a proper off switch before it goes near customers or suppliers.
FAFF FACTOR: MEDIUM · COST: ££ · RISK: JOBS DONE WHILE YOU'RE OFFLINE
Do this instead: pick the one boring weekly job you'd hand over first and write the steps down. If you can't do it in five lines, an AI agent won't manage it either.
Our take: something that runs while I'm not looking has to earn that. Chasing a delivery, maybe. Paying a supplier, not a chance.
02 · HYPE WATCH
"£3.7bn a year lost to missed calls"
That's BT's headline for the launch of its AI receptionist on 1 October. The note at the bottom of the press release explains how they got there.
A polling firm asked 1,500 bosses to guess what missed calls had cost them so far this year. BT took the middle of each answer band, stretched it to a full year and multiplied it across every small firm in the country.
Answers from firms with 50 to 249 staff were "implausibly low", BT says, so it used the smaller firms' rate instead. That one step adds about £1bn, over a quarter of the total.
The note does admit "The figure is based on respondents' own estimates and is indicative."
For a firm with 1 to 9 staff, the guess works out at £1,597 a year. About £30 a week. Missed calls do cost money, but that's the number to hold any AI receptionist price up against.
Do this instead: for one normal week, count the missed calls you never rang back. A better voicemail message and diverting to your mobile cost nothing. Then decide if a robot's worth paying for.
03 · MONDAY FIX · 20 MINUTES
Write the job ad you keep putting off
Most small-firm job ads are a copy of the last one, or three lines on Facebook. And a few innocent-sounding words can land you in bother. Acas says phrases like "recent graduate" or "highly experienced" can discriminate on age, and you'd need to justify them. Paste this into ChatGPT, Claude or Copilot:
I run a [type of business] in [town] with [number] staff. I'm hiring a
[role], [hours], paying £[amount]. The main jobs are: [3 to 5 points].
Write a job advert under 250 words in plain English: what the job is,
what a normal week looks like, what we need (must-haves only), what we
offer, and how to apply. Describe the job, not the person. Don't use
phrases like "young", "recent graduate", "highly experienced" or
gendered job titles.Then read it once more for anything that describes the person rather than the job ("energetic", "digital native", "handyman"). And check the pay and hours, because AI will happily round them up for you.
04 · QUICK BITS
Non-competes are on borrowed time. On 9 October the Prime Minister said the government will legislate to limit them. No details or dates yet.
You're not the only one borrowing. An HSBC UK survey found 56% of business leaders took on new borrowing or credit in the past year, up from 28%.
Check your tax software. One in three products on HMRC's Making Tax Digital list can't yet file a full tax return. Sole trader or landlord over £50,000? Ask yours now.
ONE-CLICK POLL
If an AI could answer your phone when you can't, would you let it?
And hit reply with roughly how many calls you miss in a normal week. I read every one.
Read the small print. See you next Monday.
P.S. If you do count your missed calls this week, reply with the number. I'm curious how close you get to that £30 a week.
