A website chatbot for car wash and detailing businesses

Detailing is sold on a description that nobody gives well. "A full valet on a Golf" and "a full valet on a Golf with two dogs and three years of school runs" are a two-hour difference. An Allinaa assistant on your website asks the questions that reveal which one it is, explains your packages from information you have approved, and collects the booking.

Packages, written so a customer can choose

Most detailing websites list three packages with overlapping bullet lists, and customers pick the cheapest because they cannot tell the difference. Write each package into the knowledge the way you would explain it standing next to the car: what is actually done, roughly how long it takes, and - the useful part - who it is for. "This one is for a car that is washed regularly"; "this one is for a car that has not been cleaned in a year". The assistant will then match a customer's own description to the right package instead of reading the list back.

Vehicle size and condition: the two multipliers

Write your size bands exactly as you price them - small, family, estate or SUV, seven-seater, van - with an example vehicle for each, because customers know their car's name and not its band. Then ask about condition, which is what actually sets the time: pet hair, smokers, children, sand, a spill, mould from a leak, overspray, tar, a car that has been standing. Each of those is worth asking about explicitly, because customers do not volunteer them and your detailer finds out at nine in the morning with a full diary.

The photo that prices the job

On Premium a customer can send photographs, and for this trade they are worth more than any questionnaire: the interior, the worst footwell, the paint in daylight, the wheels. The assistant describes what is clearly visible and will not promise that a specific mark will come out - that judgement is yours, from the photograph, before you commit to a slot. A customer who is told honestly that a stain may not lift completely is a satisfied customer afterwards; one who is promised a miracle is not. See files customers send.

What it must not promise

Configure the assistant so that it does not guarantee the removal of any mark, smell, scratch or dent; does not quote a price for a vehicle it has not seen beyond your published package prices; does not promise a duration for a condition-dependent job; and does not say whether paint can be corrected without seeing it. If your website publishes package prices, it quotes those exactly, because it quotes only what is written in your knowledge.

The practical questions

• Whether you are a unit, mobile, or both - and if mobile, what you need on site: parking, water, power
• Your area, and what you charge for travel
• Whether the customer waits, leaves the car, or gets collection and delivery
• What happens in the rain, for mobile work
• Your deposit and your no-show policy, in the words you use
• Whether you take vans, motorhomes, motorcycles or boats

The mobile-requirements answer prevents the most common wasted journey in the trade, and it belongs on the website rather than in a text message the morning of the job.

Bookings and subscriptions

The assistant has no access to your diary, so it must not offer a slot or hold one: it collects the vehicle, the package, the condition and the preferred days, then offers the inquiry form. The customer confirms their own contact details and agrees to be contacted, you get an e-mail, and the booking request waits in your inbox with a status, private notes and CSV export. If you sell a monthly wash plan, write how it works, what it includes and how to cancel - and note that the assistant cannot look up or change anybody's existing plan, and should hand that to a person. See appointment requests and the launch checklist.