Vendor front-gate recon — what actually answers when we call

Silent probe calls to every dialable preferred vendor for Camellia, plus re-probes of every inconclusive result: we dialed, sent zero audio (no agent, no speech — a recorded pause), captured what the far end played, and hung up within 50 seconds. Transcribed locally.

2026-07-30 · trigger: Fede called Miracle Method and hit an automated menu before reaching a human

Caller-ID correction (same day). This sweep dialed from TWILIO_PHONE_NUMBER, which is Camellia's production line — not a neutral PropFlow number as first reported. So these businesses saw a live customer's number in their caller ID, and a callback would have reached Camellia's Clara. Fede's ruling: probe from The Willows (the test property, +1 844-285-3526) instead. The harness now defaults to that line and refuses any caller ID that routes to a live customer.

What we learned

StatValueWhy it matters
Businesses silently probed8111 of Camellia’s dialable preferred vendors + 70 independent Denver-area vendor businesses across 34 trades. 89 calls total (re-probes included). Nothing was ever said on any of them.
Put a human on the line43 (53%)Just over half. The other half is the actual product problem.
Camellia’s roster vs. the open market55% vs 53%Statistically the same. Camellia is not unlucky — this is what calling vendors looks like everywhere.
Behind a keypad gate19 (23%)IVR menus + one data-entry gate. Clara cannot press a single key today, so every one of these is a hard stop.
Went to voicemail13 (16%)The largest single non-human outcome — and we have no voicemail script in production.
Never answered2Rang out entirely, across repeat attempts hours apart.
Front-gate classifier accuracy74% (52/70)Hand-audited against full transcripts. Not good enough to gate a dial on. The corpus below is the fix.
New archetype foundHold queue“Please hold for the next available operator” — neither menu nor voicemail. Needs Clara to wait, a behavior she does not have.

The one-line version: roughly one vendor call in two hits something the agent cannot currently get past — a keypad, a voicemail box, or a hold queue — and the classifier meant to detect which one is wrong a quarter of the time. Both are fixable; neither is fixed.

Live battery result (Jul 30 evening) — the keypad press does not reach the phone line

The simulator is live in production and the first real agent-vs-simulator call ran tonight. The agent did everything right and the call still failed — the tone it “pressed” never physically reached the line.

What happened, leg by leg: the agent dialed the armed simulator (a menu gate: “press one for a representative”), listened to the whole menu, invoked its keypad tool with digit 1 and the correct stated reason, waited silently, heard the menu replay, pressed 1 again — textbook behavior, exactly what the prompt trains. But the simulator’s digit collector received nothing, twice, and the gate hung up. A frequency scan of the call audio confirms no touch-tone is present in the media stream at all.

A control call through the same armed simulator — a scripted Twilio call sending the digit the standard out-of-band way — passed cleanly (menu → digit 1 registered → connected). So the simulator, the deployment, and the judging pipeline are all proven; the failure is isolated to how ElevenLabs transmits key presses on our current phone integration.

Root cause (docs-confirmed): on the Twilio-native integration we use today, ElevenLabs can only play key presses as in-band audio, and its own docs flag that receivers may not detect them — in our test the tone never even made it into the stream. Reliable out-of-band key presses (RFC 4733) exist but only on ElevenLabs’ SIP-trunking integration; the setting is ignored on native. Implication: every keypad-gate behavior we shipped is blocked at the transport layer until the phone integration moves to SIP trunking — an infrastructure decision held for Fede, because it changes how every ElevenLabs call is placed and a careless test setup (registering a number twice) could confuse production caller-ID resolution. Also fixed en route: the simulator’s webhook was being blocked by the platform’s auth layer in production (calls died as “busy”) — now allowlisted and verified live.

Reversal (later that night) — the keypad works on real phone lines; the failure was our own test path

A Fede-authorized follow-up probe against real business IVRs flipped the verdict. A silent, minimal test agent (never speaks, hangs up instantly on any human, one call per business, informational options only) called three real gates. At Miracle Method’s national ZIP prompt it keyed 80014 — and the IVR answered with a ZIP-specific database response (“no office services residential customers in your ZIP code”). The gate consumed all five digits. Over a real carrier path, the key presses arrive. The other two targets (Royal Textile, TK Elevator) were inconclusive for an unrelated reason: every option on their menus routes to a human, so the agent correctly pressed nothing.

What actually broke earlier tonight: a frequency scan shows no audible tone in any recording — including the call the real IVR demonstrably heard. ElevenLabs is signaling the key press out-of-band at the phone-network layer; real carrier gateways regenerate it for the far end, but a Twilio-to-Twilio on-net call (our simulator path) never performs that regeneration, so the simulator alone is deaf to it. Implication: the agent’s keypad capability is production-viable on the current integration; it is the simulator that needs a transport fix, and the SIP-trunking migration drops from “blocker” to “nice-to-have for guaranteed delivery.” Two PoCs (SIP trunk transport, verified caller ID) were run the same night to complete the picture.

The night’s four experiments, consolidated — what actually blocks production

After the reversal, four parallel experiments ran the same night: a SIP-trunk transport proof, a verified-caller-ID proof, a keypad probe at the three roster vendors with keypad gates, and an after-hours practice sweep. Together they replace tonight’s one-blocker story with a precise two-blocker one.

Blocker 1 (the real one): the agent often never gets a turn to press

On menus that talk continuously — Royal Textile’s runs 75+ seconds without a pause — the speech platform transcribes the whole menu as one unbroken caller turn, and the agent is never given a turn in which to invoke the keypad tool. Every keypad success this night (the simulator, Miracle Method’s ZIP gate) came at a gate that pauses and waits; every continuous menu defeated the agent before transport even mattered. This is a turn-taking limitation, and SIP trunking does not fix it.

Blocker 2 (solved, pending a decision): tone delivery — SIP trunking fixes it, proven

When presses do fire, delivery over the current integration is a coin flip: Miracle Method’s ZIP database heard all five digits, but two other real IVRs provably heard nothing (“that is an invalid selection”). The SIP-trunk proof-of-concept settled it: through a real SIP trunk, the press registered at the simulator’s digit collector and the menu advanced — the exact call that fails on the current integration. Migrating the calling line to SIP trunking makes delivery deterministic instead of carrier-dependent.

Also proven tonight

The verified-caller-ID chain works end to end (verify → import as outbound-only → live call presents the number; the code resolves it unchanged) — the Camellia office landline needs only a scheduled 2-minute code-entry by a human at the desk. The agent’s judgment was flawless across every live call: it refused every emergency/on-call option, hung up on humans within seconds without speaking a word, never left a message, and correctly declined menus with no safe option. And a standing outbound-only probe line now exists with replies dead by construction.

Bottom line: caller ID is ready to schedule; tone delivery has a proven fix awaiting a go; turn-taking on continuous menus is the one open capability problem and the right next engineering target.

Learnings & what they change

Eight things this recon established that we did not know when it started. Each one names the product change it implies — none of these are built yet.

1. A front gate can exist entirely outside the call

We dialed Blue Sky Plumbing at +1 720-617-0417 and said nothing. Forty-two seconds later a text arrived from +1 719-249-6381 — a different number, a different area code — opening with “It looks like we got a call from you. Is there anything we can help with? Reply STOP to opt out.” That is missed-call text-back lead recovery, almost certainly automated, though we could not identify the platform behind the number.

Implication: the classifier sorts what answers the phone, and this answered somewhere else entirely. “We called and got voicemail” is no longer the end of the interaction. Clara has to expect an inbound text she did not initiate, on a number she has never seen, minutes after a call she thought was over — and connect it back to the job she was calling about.

2. Clara cannot exit a conversation

She correctly read that text-back as a machine and tried to disengage. It took eleven messages over fourteen minutes — “Take care!”, “👋”, “Nothing further needed here” — because the far end was also a model with no terminal condition, and each polite close invited another. Two agents deadlocked in a goodbye loop.

Implication: the existing machine-sender suppression list cannot fix this. It matches pre-registered numbers, and no list can enumerate every business we might dial. What is missing is the ability to recognize a loop in progress and go silent. That is a behavior, not a list.

3. Silent probes generate callbacks — on both channels

Within thirty minutes of the sweep, four businesses called the Willows line back and one texted. This is not a defect in the probe; it is what happens when you dial a business and say nothing. Inbound was temporarily pointed away from Clara once it started.

Implication: any future sweep needs the callback path decided before the first dial, not after. And it is the concrete version of the caller-ID tradeoff: whatever number we present is a number strangers will ring back.

4. A hold queue is its own archetype

Piper Electric plays “please hold for the next available operator,” then a human arrives about twenty seconds in. Overhead Door does the same and nobody arrived inside our cap. Neither is a menu, a voicemail, or a ring-out.

Implication: the correct behavior is to wait — and waiting is a thing the agent does not currently know how to do. It needs a hold-tolerant mode with its own timeout, distinct from the no-answer retry path.

5. The classifier is not trustworthy yet

Hand-audited against full transcripts, it was wrong on 18 of 70 (26%). Two failure modes dominate: modern voicemail greetings end with “press 1 for more options,” which trips the menu rule; and terse human pickups (“Colorado Sewer. Hello?”) match none of the human phrases.

Implication: do not gate a dial on this classifier. The 89-call corpus is the material to rebuild the rules against — and the per-row “classifier said” annotations below are the labelled training set.

6. Camellia is not an unlucky sample

Camellia’s roster reaches a human 55% of the time; 70 independent Denver businesses reached 53%. Statistically identical.

Implication: this is not a Camellia onboarding problem to be fixed with a better vendor list. Roughly half of all vendor calls hit a gate, and that is the permanent operating condition of the product.

7. Probing surfaces vendor data errors nothing else would catch

HD Painting’s contact record carries Camellia’s own phone number. Only dialing it revealed that — the record looks perfectly well-formed. A job dispatched to that vendor today calls the property.

Implication: a silent probe is a cheap data-quality check, not just recon. Worth running once per vendor at onboarding, before the first real dial.

8. The keypad is the single largest unlock

19 of 81 businesses (23%) sit behind a keypad gate. ElevenLabs ships a keypad tool on the native Twilio integration; we have never used it, and the agent cannot press a key today.

Implication: before pointing a key-pressing agent at real vendors, the presses need to be proven against simulated gates we control — a press-1 menu, a ZIP-entry gate, a hold queue — so we can measure whether a keypress actually registers without experimenting on Camellia’s vendors.

The headline

Half of Camellia's preferred vendors do not put a human on the line when you call. Across 19 silent probes covering all 12 dialable roster vendors: 6 reach a person (4 immediately, 2 after a queue or hold music), 2 sit behind a phone menu even at their best number, 3 go to voicemail, and 1 never answers at all. Our outbound agent has been tested against exactly one of those five situations, and it currently cannot press a single key.

This is a better picture than the first sweep suggested — because six vendors had no phone on file at all, and the numbers we found for them are mostly good ones. Details in the backfill section.

What answers, across all 12 dialable vendors

What answersCountVendors
Human, direct4Anchor Pest · TK Elevator (720) · A to Z Elevator · A&K Appliance
Human, after queue/music2MTech (plumbing dept) · American Garage Door
Phone menu (IVR)2Miracle Method (press 1) · Royal Textile (5 options)
Voicemail2Metropolitan Bldg Maintenance · Cardenas Landscape
Not validly probed1HD Painting — the number on file is Camellia’s own line (see correction)
Never answers1Western States Fire Protection (two probes, hours apart)
No number exists1Cambay, Inc. — see note below

Data error found by this sweep — HD Painting’s phone is Camellia’s own number. The contact record for HD Painting carries +1 303-861-1057, which is the property’s line, not the painter’s. Our probe therefore dialed Camellia, was forwarded, and hit a generic voicemail — which we first published as HD Painting’s front gate. That row is now void and the vendor is unprobed. The bad claim was written 2026-05-26, two months before this sweep, so it came from the original vendor ingest rather than from any backfill run here. Live consequence: an outbound job dispatched to HD Painting today would call the property instead of the painter.

On Cambay: not a phantom — it is a genuine Camellia vendor, but its trade is exterior coating, which has no canonical slug in our vocabulary. The seeding code deliberately put it in a "report only, do not add to the roster" bucket for that reason; it reached the live roster under construction anyway, added by the platform smoke-test account. It was never dispatchable (unconfirmed entries are excluded from dispatch). The fix is a real trade for coatings work, not deleting the vendor.

Probe results, vendor by vendor

Vendor (trade)Front gateTime to outcomeWhat we heard
Miracle Method (refinishing) IVR — data-entry gate menu still running at 50s National franchise line. Recorded-line notice, then:
"To reach the nearest Miracle Method location, please enter your five-digit zip code now. To reach our commercial services team, press 2. For franchise sales, press 3. Or to be transferred to our corporate office, press 0…"
Matches Fede's live call: gate first, then transfer with hold music to the local office ("this is Ana"). Data issue: our stored number is the national 888 line, not the Denver office.
Anchor Pest Control (pest control) Human, direct answered ~5s, hung up on our silence at 16s
"Good morning, Anchor Pest Control, this is Denise."
American Garage Door (garage door) Human, after music music on answer, human by ~8s
(soft piano music) … "American Garage Door."
Brief music/announcement on pickup, then a person.
A to Z Elevator Inspections (elevator) Answered, unclear 7-second call Answered immediately; greeting cut off when they hung up on our silence. Transcript garbled ("Eight is the elevator instructions" ≈ "A to Z Elevator Inspections"). Likely human-direct; needs one re-probe to classify.
HD Painting (painting) Not validly probed n/a We dialed the wrong number. The phone on HD Painting's contact record is Camellia's own line — so this probe called the property, was forwarded, and reached a generic voicemail we initially filed as the painter's. HD Painting's real front gate is unknown. See the data-error note above.
Western States Fire Protection (fire safety) No answer rang out, ~50s No pickup, no voicemail within the probe window.

Round 2 — the seven vendors that had no phone on file (now backfilled)

7 of the 13 roster vendors had no phone in the contact store — including MTech, the biggest 2026 spender. Numbers were recovered from the mined invoice PDFs + the vendors' own published listings, probe-verified, and written to the contact store the same afternoon (Fede-authorized). The roster now resolves 12 of 13.

Vendor (trade)Number storedFront gateWhat we heard
MTech Service (plumbing)(303) 393-7271Human, after queuePlumbing-department line: auto-greeting → brief hold music → "MTech Services, this is Ashley." The main line (303 650-4000) routes to an HVAC hold queue instead — the department line is the right number for our trade.
TK Elevator (elevator)(720) 436-4627Human, direct"Good morning, this is Richard with TK Elevator." The 303 number from invoices is the national press-1/2/3 menu; the 720 line goes straight to a person.
Royal Textile (window coverings)(303) 572-3800IVR menuFive-option menu naming the company; "contractor or commercial project client… press 2" is our lane.
A & K Appliance (appliance)(303) 985-1952Answered, unclearAnswered in ~5s, hung up on our silence mid-greeting. Likely human-direct. Inbound history already knew this number — its caller person ("Maddie") is now the vendor's contact.
Metropolitan Bldg Maintenance (cleaning)(303) 727-8656VoicemailCompany voicemail naming the business, hours 9–6 M–F, and an emergency line (303 435-0590) — identity confirmed by the greeting itself.
Cardenas Landscape (landscaping)(720) 272-1334VoicemailGeneric carrier voicemail (no company name spoken) — number sourced from the City of Northglenn business listing; identity from the listing, not the greeting.
Cambay, Inc. (construction)noneUnresolvedNo Denver-area construction business by this name found anywhere. The roster entry came from email mining and is unconfirmed (so it was never dispatchable). Recommend the PM confirms or removes it.

Backfill mechanics: numbers written through the supported contact lifecycle (claim add/promote/deprecate and the spine-stamped membership writer), verified through the same resolver the dial path reads. A bonus of the spine-stamp path: vendors who had called Camellia before had their historic caller records unified with the vendor contact — inbound calls from these numbers now recognize as the vendor.

Can the agent handle this? (ElevenLabs research, docs-cited)

What each archetype means for vendor calling

ArchetypeSeen atAgent requirement
Human, directAnchor Pest, (likely) A to ZToday's tested path. Works.
Music, then humanAmerican Garage DoorDon't treat pickup-audio as a greeting; wait for a voice. Low risk.
IVR menu / data-entryMiracle MethodKeypad tool + prompt training + property ZIP in context. Not built.
VoicemailMetropolitan · CardenasDecide: leave a callback message (what to say, which number) or hang up and retry+SMS. Policy not decided.
No answerWestern States FireRetry schedule + fall back to SMS/email. Retry logic exists for the turnover wedge; needs wiring to ring-out.

The test harness

Phase 1 — the probe (built, this is how this report was made). A repeatable silent-capture probe: dials a target from the PropFlow line, transmits no audio, records up to 50s, transcribes locally (whisper), classifies the front gate. Rerunnable any time a vendor changes their phone system, and before any first real dial to a new vendor — the front-gate class becomes a fact we store on the vendor, not a surprise mid-call.

Phase 2 — simulated front-gates on the QA bench (design). Before enabling the keypad tool against real vendors, put each archetype behind our own test numbers as TwiML apps: a press-1 menu, a ZIP-entry gate (<Gather> logs the digits the agent actually sends — pass/fail is objective), hold music with delayed human (the robo bench picks up after N seconds), voicemail, and ring-out. Then run the standard robo-vendor QA battery through each gate. No real vendor hears a test call, and DTMF reliability is measured, not assumed.

Decisions this surfaces (Fede)

  1. Fix the numbers first: approve the phone-mining backfill (7 missing + replace Miracle Method's national line with the Denver office number). Highest-leverage, no new capability needed — with a local number, Miracle Method may be a human-direct call.
  2. Voicemail policy: what may the agent say to a vendor's voicemail, if anything?
  3. IVR navigation: greenlight enabling play_keypad_touch_tone + prompt work + Phase-2 harness before any real-vendor IVR attempt.
  4. Ring-out handling: confirm retry + SMS fallback as the no-answer behavior.

Every call: recording + transcript

All 19 probes, grouped by what answered. Audio is embedded in this page (compressed); transcripts are the raw local whisper output, unedited — including its stumbles on cut-off greetings.

Anchor Pest Control pest control · (303) 239-0559 · 16s
Human, direct
Good morning, Anchor Pest Control, this is Denise.
TK Elevator — 720 local elevator · (720) 436-4627 · 14s
Human, direct
Good morning. This is Richard with TK Elevator. Hello.
A to Z Elevator Inspections elevator · (720) 916-5180 · 7s
Human, direct
A to Z elevator inspections.

First of two probes. Answers instantly with the company name, then hangs up on our silence.

A to Z Elevator Inspections — 2nd probe elevator · (720) 916-5180 · 19s
Human, direct
A to Z elevator instructions.

Re-probe from The Willows line. Same behavior; ASR renders "inspections" as "instructions".

A & K Appliance Service appliance · (303) 985-1952 · 5s
Human, direct
and care plan to get up here

TRANSCRIPT UNRELIABLE — 5s of audio; two different decodes produced two different sentences. Classified by call SHAPE (instant human-length answer, no menu tones, no voicemail beep), not by the text.

A & K Appliance Service — 2nd probe appliance · (303) 985-1952 · 7s
Human, direct
and Kia O'Connor, and I'll see you next time.

Re-probe from The Willows line. Same 7s shape; transcript again unreliable.

MTech Service — plumbing department plumbing · (303) 393-7271 · 30s
Human, after queue
Thank you for choosing M-TECH Service. You have reached the plumbing department. Please hold for the next available representative. (gentle music) - M-TECH Services, this is Ashley. M-TECH Services, this is Ashley.

The number we now store for MTech.

American Garage Door garage door · (303) 321-6065 · 18s
Human, after music
American Garage Door.
MTech Service — main line plumbing/HVAC · (303) 650-4000 · 50s
Operator → HVAC hold queue
(phone rings) (phone rings) - I'm Simon Gansville. How may I direct your call? Hello? Hello? Thank you for choosing MTEC. You have reached our HVAC service department. Please hold while we connect your call. Thank you for continuing to hold. If you prefer to leave a voicemail and receive a call back from one of our HVAC service dispatchers, please press two. Otherwise, please continue to hold and we will be with you momentarily.

A live operator appears to answer first ("how may I direct your call? Hello? Hello?"), then our silence lands us in the HVAC hold queue. This is why the plumbing department line, not this one, is what we store.

Miracle Method of Denver — 720 local refinishing · (720) 336-7492 · 45s
IVR — press 1
This call may be recorded for quality and training. Thank you for calling Miracle Method to speak to a representative. Press 1.

The number we now store. Simple, loops until you press.

Miracle Method — 888 national refinishing · (888) 271-7690 · 50s
IVR — ZIP data-entry gate
This call may be recorded for quality and training. - Thank you for calling Miracle Method. We've been making bathtubs, tile and countertops look like new for over 40 years. To reach the nearest Miracle Method location, please enter your five digit zip code now. To reach our commercial services team, press two. For franchise sales, press three. Or to be transferred to our corporate office, press zero now. In the meantime, check out our website at miraclemethod.com to see some amazing before and after photos and to learn why Miracle Method is your absolute best choice for refinishing. Thanks again for calling Miracle Method. - Thank you for contacting us.

The number we USED to store. Demands a typed five-digit ZIP to route to a location — a harder gate than any menu.

TK Elevator — 303 national elevator · (303) 790-8566 · 50s
IVR — 5-option menu
Thank you for calling TK Elevator. Please listen closely as our menu options have changed. (speaking in Spanish) Thank you for calling TK Elevator. To place a new service request, press one. To check on an existing request, press two. To reach your local branch, press three. To speak with corporate customer care, press four. To repeat the menu options, press five. Thank you for calling TK Elevator. A representative will be with you shortly. This call may be recorded and-

The number printed on their invoices. Superseded by the 720 local line, which reaches a person.

Royal Textile Products window coverings · (303) 572-3800 · 50s
IVR — 5-option menu
Thank you for calling Royal Textile Products where we specialize in providing high-quality window coverings. Please listen carefully to the following options. If you are a standard client looking to place an order, check the status of an existing order, get a quote, make a payment, or schedule a service, please press 1. If you are a contractor or commercial project client needing to check the status of a project or schedule a service, please press 2. For contractor estimates or to speak with our bidding team, please press 3. For questions about invoices, payments, or contractor billing, please press 4. For insurance-related questions or compliance documentation, please press 5. To request samples, updates, to

"Contractor or commercial project client… press 2" is our lane.

Metropolitan Bldg Maintenance cleaning · (303) 727-8656 · 50s
Voicemail — company greeting
Hello, you reached Metropolitan Building Maintenance. Our hours are 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday through Friday. If you have an emergency, please call our emergency line at 303-435-0590. Otherwise, please leave a message and we'll return your call as soon as possible. Thank you. At the tone, please record your message. When you've finished recording, you may hang up or press one for more options. To leave a callback number, press five.

Names the business, hours, and an emergency line — identity confirmed by the greeting itself.

HD Painting — VOID, wrong number painting · (303) 861-1057 = Camellia’s own line · 18s
Not a vendor capture
Hello, please leave a message after the tone.

A solo operator's cell.

Cardenas Landscape landscaping · (720) 272-1334 · 50s
Voicemail — generic carrier
telephone number, 7-2-0-2-7-2-1-3-3-4. Can't take your call now. At the tone, please record your message. When you've finished recording, simply hang up or press pound for further options. (beep) I couldn't hear you. Please try again. At the tone, please record your message. When you've finished recording, simply hang up or press pound for further options. (beep) I couldn't hear you. Please try again. At the tone, please record your message. When you've finished recording, simply hang up or press pound.

No company name spoken; identity rests on the city business listing, not the greeting.

Western States Fire Protection fire safety · (303) 992-6223 · 0s
No answer — rang out

No audio — the call never connected, so nothing was recorded.

No speech captured.

Probe 1.

Western States Fire Protection — 2nd probe fire safety · (303) 992-6223 · 0s
No answer — rang out

No audio — the call never connected, so nothing was recorded.

No speech captured.

Probe 2, hours later, from a different line. Consistently unreachable by phone.

Cardenas Landscaping — 303 directory listing landscaping · (303) 451-8798 · 0s
Call failed — number not in service

No audio — the call never connected, so nothing was recorded.

No speech captured.

Why the 720 number is the one we stored.

Second sweep — 67 Denver-area vendor businesses, all trades

To find out whether Camellia’s roster is typical, we ran the same silent probe against 70 independent Denver-area businesses across 34 trades — the kinds of vendors an apartment property actually hires. Nothing was said on any call.

37 of 70 (53%) put a human on the line. That is statistically the same as Camellia’s own roster (55%) — so Camellia is not an unlucky sample, this is simply what calling vendors looks like. Either way, roughly one call in two hits a gate, a voicemail, or a hold queue that today’s agent cannot get past.

What answeredCountShare
Human answered directly3651%
IVR menu — press N1623%
Voicemail1116%
Answered, unclassifiable34%
Human, after a hold queue11%
IVR data-entry gate11%
Hold queue — no human within the cap11%
No answer — rang out11%

Accuracy note — the classifier is not yet trustworthy. The shipped classifier (front-gate-classify.ts) was run over all 70 captures, then every verdict was hand-checked against the full transcript. It got 18 of 70 wrong (26%). Two failure modes dominate: modern voicemail greetings end with “press 1 for more options”, which trips the menu rule; and terse human pickups (“Colorado Sewer. Hello?”) match none of the human phrases. The counts above are the audited ones. This corpus is exactly what the rules need to be rebuilt against.

Audio for all 67 calls is archived locally (~/.claude/vendor-recon-recordings/2026-07-30-sweep/, 41 MB) and retained in Twilio; nothing was deleted. Transcripts are inlined below rather than the audio, to keep this page loadable.

Human answered directly — 36

Wilson & Myers (720) 616-2100 · 29s
Human answered directly
This call is being recorded for quality assurance purposes.
 (phone ringing)
 - Hello, my name is Alex and Susan Myers.
 How can I help you?
 Hello?
 I can't kill you, Jeff and Keith.
Certainty Appliance Repair Llc (303) 456-2661 · 10s
Human answered directly
to your plans prepared. This is Chris.
High City Appliance (720) 940-3240 · 35s (classifier said: Answered, unclassifiable)
Human answered directly
- Thank you for calling High City Appliance.
 This call will be recorded for quality purposes.
 (phone ringing)
 Hello, thank you for calling High City Appliance.
 So can I help you?
 Hello, can you hear me?
Fresh Look Refinishing (720) 295-0513 · 7s
Human answered directly
This is Martha.
 Hello.
Denver Bathtub & Tile Reglazing (720) 277-4762 · 15s
Human answered directly
Thank you for calling us in for about the mortality place and this is true. How can I help you today?
 Hello
 Hello
Mechanical Solutions Inc (303) 789-1700 · 11s
Human answered directly
And this is Rhonda, mechanical fluitions.
Chiller Systems Service (303) 275-6250 · 17s (classifier said: Answered, unclassifiable)
Human answered directly
[ Beeping ]
 >> Solar System Service is the sort of.
Bear Cleaning & Restoration (303) 431-2704 · 36s
Human answered directly
All calls are recorded for quality and training purposes.
 (phone ringing)
 - Hey, thank you for calling Burger Cleaning Restoration.
 This is David.
 How may I help you?
 Hey, can you hear me?
 Hello, can you hear me?
Impression Carpet Cleaning And Rep (720) 420-9117 · 6s
Human answered directly
Impressions. This is Katie. I'm going to help you.
Roto Rooter Plumbing & Water Clean (303) 666-0045 · 36s
Human answered directly
>> Thanks for choosing Roto Rooter.
 Roto Rooter and its partners may record all calls for quality assurance.
 Did you know Roto Rooter has a mobile app?
 Download it now on iOS or Android to schedule same-day service,
 access coupons, and track your service status.
 >> Thank you for calling Roto Rooter.
 My name is Zach, how can I help you?
 Hello, Colleen.
Master Rooter Plumbing (720) 434-3406 · 25s
Human answered directly
To ensure the highest quality service, this call may be monitored and recorded.
 All calls may be recorded. Please stay on the line.
 Thank you for calling Master Services. This is Dorina. How can we help you?
 So.
Padron Drywall (720) 796-4501 · 35s
Human answered directly
Hi, thank you for calling Padrin Drywall. This is Emily. How can I help you today?
 Just checking in. Are you still there? If you need a minute, that's totally fine.
 Let me know how I can help when you're ready.
Allstar Electrical Services (303) 399-7420 · 12s
Human answered directly
I'll start electrical. This is John.
 I'll start electrical. This is John.
The Electricians Co (720) 303-0150 · 20s
Human answered directly
This call may be monitored or recorded.
 Thank you for calling me, electricians.
 How can I help you?
Mei Total Elevator Solutions (720) 639-8767 · 25s
Human answered directly
M-E-I-Elevator, this is Ashley.
 Hello, M-E-I-Elevator.
 Can anyone hear me?
Denver Fire Alarm Inc (303) 720-6537 · 17s
Human answered directly
Denver fire alarm. This is page.
 Hello?
 Hello?
H2O Fire Protection Inc (303) 761-7755 · 15s (classifier said: Answered, unclassifiable)
Human answered directly
I think you were telling H2O fire protector on this to Charlene's hope, can I help you?
 Wow!
Vectra Mechanical (720) 303-3793 · 35s
Human answered directly
To ensure the highest quality service, this call may be monitored and recorded.
 Thank you for calling vector mechanicals, it's my fellow, how can I help you?
3Rd Gen Garage Doors (720) 697-0418 · 9s (classifier said: Answered, unclassifiable)
Human answered directly
- Hello.
 Hello.
Standard Fence Company (303) 433-7301 · 15s
Human answered directly
[ Beeping ]
 Good morning, Standard funds.
All About Glass Of Colorado (303) 618-0417 · 9s (classifier said: Answered, unclassifiable)
Human answered directly
All about glasses and darcy.
Minuteman Heating & Cooling (303) 400-0111 · 35s
Human answered directly
This call is being recorded.
 Thank you for calling minute, man. This is Brian. How can I help you?
 Hello?
Clear Creek Mechanical (303) 287-8128 · 9s
Human answered directly
is the answering service, how can I help you?
Colorado Commercial & Residential (303) 574-1740 · 22s
Human answered directly
will be recorded and monitored for quality and training purposes.
 Thank you for calling Colorado painting. This is Gentry. How can I help you?
 Hello?
Preferred Painting (303) 695-0147 · 14s
Human answered directly
How can I help you?
Kg Facility Solutions (303) 665-9757 · 14s
Human answered directly
KG Facility Solutions promotes healthy, safe, and clean environments that utilize...
 Good afternoon, KG Facility Solutions.
Big League Clean (970) 805-0988 · 16s (classifier said: Answered, unclassifiable)
Human answered directly
Bigly clean, not gonna help you.
 Hello?
 Hello?
Front Range Locksmith (720) 439-4081 · 17s (classifier said: Answered, unclassifiable)
Human answered directly
- Lock me service.
 Lock me service.
 Hello?
Excel Locksmith Denver (720) 432-2540 · 16s (classifier said: Answered, unclassifiable)
Human answered directly
Thanks a lot, it was hard for me to help. Hello? Hello?
Colorado Pest Management (303) 706-9616 · 24s
Human answered directly
(phone ringing)
 - All right, I passed management.
 This is Nikki, how can I help you?
 Hello?
 You gonna talk?
Splat Pest Management (720) 436-5248 · 8s (classifier said: Answered, unclassifiable)
Human answered directly
Splat is a dinner. It's good.
Colorado Sewer Service Inc (303) 578-2936 · 18s (classifier said: Answered, unclassifiable)
Human answered directly
(phone ringing)
 (phone ringing)
 Colorado sewer.
 Hello?
Blue Sky Plumbing Heating Coolin (720) 617-0417 · 35s
Human answered directly
Your call may be monitored or recorded for quality assurance.
 Hi, this is Blue Sky Plumbing Heating, Cooling and Electric.
 What can I help you with today?
 Just checking in.
 Are you still there?
 Let me know how I can help.
 Okay, just making sure you're still with me.
Denver S Best Heating And Ac Repai (303) 327-9208 · 13s
Human answered directly
Thank you for calling Denver's best.
 This is Stephanie.
 How can I help you?
 Hello.
All Phase Restoration (303) 749-5830 · 12s
Human answered directly
All phase restoration.
 This is case speaking.
 How may I help you?
 Hello?
Colorado Wildlife Specialists (720) 248-8581 · 14s
Human answered directly
I call her in a while like specialist, this is Kristen.
 Hello.
 Hello.

IVR menu — press N — 16

Redi Carpet Sales Of Colorado (303) 321-7026 · 35s
IVR menu — press N
Thank you for calling Ready Carpet.
 Please listen closely as our menu options have changed.
 If you know the extension of the person you are calling, please press star for customer
 service or to place an order.
 Press 1 for operations, press 2 for the general manager, press 3 for billing, press 4 for
 purchasing, press 5 for the credit department, press 6 for the accounts payable department,
 press 7 to search the company directory by first name, press 8 to search the company directory
 by last name, press 9.
Drain Pros Plumbing (720) 664-8988 · 35s
IVR menu — press N
Thank you for your call. Please press 1 to be connected to the party you're calling.
 Thank you for your call. Please press 1 to be connected to the party you're calling.
 Thank you for your call. Please press 1 to be connected to the party you're calling.
 Sorry, your call could not be completed.
Home Drywall And Painting (720) 583-5891 · 35s
IVR menu — press N
Thanks for calling home drywall and painting.
 If you'd like to schedule an estimate, please press 1.
 If you are an existing customer
 and have questions about your job, please press 2.
 If it's after business hours, please call
 your project manager directly.
 For all other inquiries, please press 3.
 Please stay on the line while your call is transferred
 to the operator.
M Md Electric (720) 203-2644 · 35s
IVR menu — press N
Thank you for calling MMD Electoric.
 If you know your party's extension,
 you may dial it at any time.
 For the operator, press zero.
 Thank you for calling MMD Electoric.
 If you know your party's extension,
 you may dial it at any time.
 For the operator, press zero.
 Thank you for calling.
Kone Elevators & Escalators Denve (303) 792-3423 · 35s
IVR menu — press N
Thank you for calling Kone's Denver office.
 To place a service call for your equipment,
 please press one or call our 24 hour
 Kone customer care center at 1-877-276-8691.
 For all other inquiries, press zero.
 Thank you for calling Kone.
Element Contract Element Flooring (720) 322-0200 · 35s
IVR menu — press N
Thank you for calling Element Contract. For new and existing projects please press 1.
 For anything else press 2.
 Please stay on the line while your call is transferred to the operator.
Major Heating & Air Conditioning (720) 856-4848 · 35s
IVR menu — press N
Thank you for your call. Please press 1 to be connected to the party you're calling.
 Thank you for your call. Please press 1 to be connected to the party you're calling.
 Sorry, your call could not be completed.
Superior Heating And Air Condition (303) 586-1100 · 35s
IVR menu — press N
Hello, you've reached superior heating and air conditioning.
 Kindly note, this call may be recorded for quality assurance purposes.
 To help us direct your call, please choose from the following options.
 For commercial service, press 1.
 For commercial construction projects, press 2.
 Or for accounting, please press 3.
 Hello?
New Perspective Painting (303) 903-2614 · 24s
IVR menu — press N
Thank you for calling New Perspective Painting.
 To schedule an estimate, please visit www.newperspectivepainting.com.
 To reach Evan Wilson, please press 1.
 Your call cannot be transferred.
 Please try again later.
 Thank you.
Impact Fire Services (303) 789-0016 · 35s
IVR menu — press N
Thank you for calling Impact Fire Services Denver.
 Press 1 for the service department.
 Press 2 for the inspections department.
 Press 3 for the billing department.
 Press 4 to get a sales quote.
 Press 5 for the administrative department.
 Hold the line or press 0 to leave a voicemail.
 Thank you.
 Thank you for calling you.
Hyper Flow Service Company (888) 541-3966 · 35s
IVR menu — press N
Hi, and thank you for calling.
 If you're a new customer, please press one.
 If you're an existing customer, please press two.
 For all other matters, please press three.
 Hi, and thank you for calling.
 If you're a new customer, please press one.
 If you're an existing customer, please press two.
 For all other matters, please press three.
Midwest Plumbing Co Llc (720) 648-0613 · 35s
IVR menu — press N
Thank you for calling Midwest Plumbing Co.
 To book an appointment, press one.
 For all other matters, press two.
 This call may be recorded for quality assurance
 and training purposes.
 Sorry, I didn't get that.
 Thank you for calling Midwest Plumbing Co.
 To book an appointment, press one.
 for all other matters, press two.
 This call may be recorded for quality assurance.
Bill Smith Plumbing & Heating (303) 781-7856 · 35s
IVR menu — press N
Thank you for calling Bill Smith Plumbing and Heating, where you can now reach us 7 days a week, 7.30 am to 4.30 pm.
 Please listen to the following menu and make your selection.
 Press 1 to speak to the service department.
 Press 2 to speak to the sales department.
 Press 3 to speak to the parts department.
 Press 4 to speak to the accounting department.
 Or press 5 for a dial by name menu.
Apex Waste Solutions (303) 841-7144 · 36s
IVR menu — press N
Thank you for calling Apex Waste Solutions. Our normal office hours are Monday through
 Friday, 7.30 a.m. to 4.30 p.m. To help us direct your call to the appropriate department,
 please listen to the following options.
 Press 1 for customer service, for questions about your account, service schedules, general
 inquiries or to set up new residential service.
 Press 2 for roll-off services, for information on dumpster rentals, delivery or pickup.
 Press 3 for billing questions, for assistance with invoices, payments or account balances.
5280 Waste Solutions (720) 884-0300 · 35s
IVR menu — press N
Thank you for calling 5280 Waste Solutions.
 To better assist you, please listen carefully
 to the following options.
 If you are a new roll-off customer, please press one.
 If you are a new residential or commercial customer,
 please press two.
 If you are an existing customer, please press three.
 Thank you for calling 5280 Waste Solutions.
 To better assist you, please listen carefully
 to the following options.
 If you are a new roll-off customer, please press one.
Critter Control Of Denver (720) 513-0613 · 35s
IVR menu — press N
This call may be recorded for quality and training purposes.
 If you are a current Critter Control customer, please press 1.
 If you are a new Critter Control customer, please press 2.
 If you are a current Critter Control customer, please press 1.
 If you are a new Critter Control customer, please press 2.

Voicemail — 11

Extreme Cleaning Company (720) 316-8127 · 35s (classifier said: Human answered directly)
Voicemail
You have reached Francisco at Extreme Cleaning Company.
 I am away from my desk right now.
 If this is an emergency, please call or text my direct cell phone at 719-250-0280.
 Otherwise, please leave a detailed message with your name and number,
 and we will return your call as soon as possible.
 Thank you and have a good one.
Complete Appliance Repair Denver (303) 904-8888 · 36s (classifier said: IVR menu — press N)
Voicemail
Your call has been forwarded to an automated voice messaging system.
 At the tell-and-please record your message when you've finished recording you may hang
 up or press 1 for more options.
Colorado Conveyance Solutions (303) 947-2561 · 18s
Voicemail
Your call has been forwarded to an Automated Voice Messaging System.
 3-0-3-9-4-7-2-5-6-1 is not available.
 The mailbox is full and cannot accept any messages at this time.
 Goodbye.
High Point Elevator (720) 381-9704 · 10s (classifier said: Answered, unclassifiable)
Voicemail
record your name and reason for calling. I'll see if this person is available.
Glass And Door Guys Llc (303) 842-3717 · 35s (classifier said: IVR menu — press N)
Voicemail
You reach Glasson door guys. I'm currently unavailable, but if you leave me a message, I will get back to you as soon as I can. Thank you.
 At the tone, please record your message. When you've finished recording, you may hang up or press 1 for more options.
Hiteland Property Services (303) 345-1229 · 35s (classifier said: Answered, unclassifiable)
Voicemail
- Hi there, you've reached the voicemail box
 of height land property services.
 I'm sorry we weren't able to take your call currently,
 but if you'll leave a detailed message,
 I will return your call as soon as possible.
 Thank you, have a great day.
Five Star Janitorial Inc (720) 495-2847 · 35s
Voicemail
your call has been forwarded to voicemail.
 The person you're trying to reach is not available.
 At the tone, please record your message.
 When you have finished recording, you may hang up.
Afford A Rooter Plumbing (720) 296-7972 · 35s
Voicemail
The person you are calling is currently unavailable.
 Please leave a message after the tone.
Spyder Construction (720) 756-3502 · 36s (classifier said: IVR menu — press N)
Voicemail
call has been forwarded to an automatic voice message system.
 - 1-7-2-0-7-5-6-3-5-0-2.
 - Not available.
 At the tone, please record your message.
 When you have finished recording,
 you may hang up or press one for more options.
Mr Hot Water Co (720) 253-4426 · 22s
Voicemail
Your call has been forwarded to voicemail.
 The person you're trying to reach is not available.
 At the tone, please record your message.
 When you have finished recording, you may hang up.
 - Hello.
 Hello.
Biggie Blinds (720) 295-2299 · 35s
Voicemail
The Google subscriber you have called is not available.
 Please leave a message after the tone.

Answered, unclassifiable — 3

Denver Elevator Company (720) 642-6600 · 16s
Answered, unclassifiable
[ Pause ]
Rocky Mountain Access Controls In (303) 339-6746 · 1s
Answered, unclassifiable
[BLANK_AUDIO]
Woven Window (303) 292-1036 · 12s
Answered, unclassifiable
Bye bye.

Human, after a hold queue — 1

Piper Electric Co & Inc (303) 422-9219 · 35s (classifier said: Answered, unclassifiable)
Human, after a hold queue
Thank you for calling Piper Electric.
 Please hold for the next available operator.
 (upbeat music)
 - Piper Electric, how may I direct your call?
 Hello?
 Hello?
 Hello?

IVR data-entry gate — 1

Integrity Fire Safety Services (303) 557-1820 · 35s
IVR data-entry gate
Thank you for calling Integrity Fire Safety Services, where your safety matters.
 Please listen closely as our options have changed.
 If you are a core customer and have been assigned a dedicated Hive team,
 please hang up and dial your team's direct number or press A at any time to hear our Hive team directory.
 If you are an existing customer without a dedicated Hive team, press 1.
 For our Western Slope Office, press 2.
 For monitoring, smoke control.

Hold queue — no human within the cap — 1

Overhead Door Company Of Denver (303) 366-4300 · 29s (classifier said: Answered, unclassifiable)
Hold queue — no human within the cap
Thank you for calling Overhead Door Company of Denver Incorporated.
 Please hold while we connect to you.

No answer — rang out — 1

Puroclean Of Central Denver (303) 993-1313 · 0s
No answer — rang out
No speech captured.

Method & retention

Method note: probes used a plain Twilio call with a silent TwiML pause — no ElevenLabs agent involved, nothing was said to anyone; humans who answered heard silence and hung up within seconds. Recordings transcribed locally with whisper (small.en). Very short captures (5–7s) are NOT reliably transcribable — two decodes of the same A&K clip produced two different sentences — so those calls are classified by call shape (how fast it answered, whether menu tones or a voicemail beep appear), never by the disputed text, and are labeled as such. Every recording is retained — in Twilio and in a local archive — and embedded above; none were deleted. Companion docs: demo run-of-show · vendor lifecycle & spend · spend UI prototypes.

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