Search for a way to connect Cliniko to your website or your phone line and you will meet a wall of adverts saying almost exactly the same words. Cliniko integration ready. AI receptionist for Cliniko. Book patients 24/7. Trusted by thousands of clinics. They cannot all be equally good, and the adverts give you nothing to tell them apart. Here are the questions that do. We sell against these products, which you should factor in, and the questions below work just as well pointed at us.

First, read the proof properly

"Trusted by 2,100+ clinics" is the standard line, and it is worth understanding what it does and does not tell you.

What it means: a lot of clinics have signed up at some point. What it does not mean: that 2,100 clinics are using it today, that they are clinics like yours, or that it works well for any of them. A free trial counts. A clinic that left last year usually still counts.

The number is not a lie, it is just a different fact than the one you are looking for. What you actually want is a clinic of roughly your size and discipline who has run it for six months. Ask for one. A vendor with thousands of happy customers can produce that instantly. Hesitation is the answer.

The seven questions

1. Where does our API key live? The only acceptable answer is: on their server, encrypted, never in the browser. A Cliniko API key is full read and write access to your patient records. If any part of the answer involves the key being in your website's code or in the page a visitor loads, stop there. See our piece on why this is the whole ball game.

2. What does it do when Cliniko is down or slow? Every system has bad minutes. The answer you want is that it fails visibly and safely: the patient is told to ring, or offered a callback, and nothing is silently lost. The answer to fear is a shrug, because the real-world version of that shrug is a booking form that spins forever at 9pm while a patient gives up.

3. Who owns the phone number? Only relevant for answering products, and it is the question that decides how trapped you are. If the number is theirs and you advertise it, leaving means changing the number on your website, your Google profile, your van and your leaflets. If the number is yours and merely forwarded to them, you can leave on an afternoon's notice. Ask this before price.

4. Can we hear a real call, not a demo? Demos are rehearsed with clear speakers who know what to say. Ask for a recording of a genuine patient call, with permission and identifying details removed. What you are listening for is what happens when the caller is vague, has an accent, interrupts, or asks something the system was not built for. That moment is the product.

5. Who writes the clinical escalation rules? If the vendor hands you their list of what counts as urgent, they have told you they are selling a generic box. That list is a clinical judgment and it must be yours. The right answer is that they ask you for it, write it down, and test it with you before go-live.

6. What happens to our data if we leave? Bookings live in Cliniko, so those are safe. But call recordings, transcripts, patient messages and the list of who was contacted may live with the vendor. Ask what you get back and what gets deleted. Ask whether the data stays in the UK or EU, because you are a healthcare provider and that question has legal weight.

7. What does the second month cost? Setup fees are advertised, monthly fees are advertised, per-call and per-minute charges usually are not. Ask what your bill looks like in your busiest week rather than an average one, and whether unused allowance rolls over.

Three routes, honestly

Option one: use what Cliniko already gives you. Cliniko's own hosted booking page is included and works. Where it genuinely wins: free, supported by Cliniko, nothing new to trust with your key. If you are not buying traffic and your phone is mostly answered, this is very likely the whole answer and you should stop reading. Where it falls down: it cannot answer a phone, and it takes patients off your site.

Option two: buy one of the advertised products. Where it genuinely wins: live in days rather than weeks, cheaper than a build, supported by a company whose entire job is that one product, and improving without you paying for it. For a standard clinic that wants the phone answered next week, this is often the right buy and we would say so. Where it falls down: your appointment types and triage get described their way, your brand is theirs, and question three above decides how easily you can ever leave.

Option three: have it built on the API for your clinic. Where it genuinely wins: your triage, your words, your escalation rules, one system behind the site and the phone, and you own it. Where it falls down: more expensive, slower to start, and it needs someone competent to maintain. This is what we sell. At a small clinic with simple needs, buying option two and spending nothing more is genuinely the better decision, and we have told people that.

The recommendation. Ask the seven questions of any vendor including us. Then choose on how standard your clinic is, not on how good the advert was. Standard needs and a tight budget point to option two. Clinical triage that matters, a brand you have invested in, or a wish to run phone, site and recalls as one thing points to option three. And if you have not yet worked out what the problem is costing you, do not buy anything at all this week.

Do this today, for nothing

Pick the two vendors whose adverts you liked most and send them the same email with questions one, three and six. Nothing else.

You will learn more from how they answer than from any sales call. Clear, specific answers to the key question and the number question mean you are dealing with people who have thought about clinics properly. Vague answers, or a swerve into a demo booking, is also information.

Send that email, then bring us the replies. Twenty minutes and we will tell you straight which one is the better buy for your clinic, including when the answer is one of them rather than us.