"Do you service my area?" reply prompt: free ChatGPT template
Updated · By Robert Breen
Use this for one of the most common emails a service business gets: "Do you come out to my town?" The answer looks simple, but an AI asked without your list will say yes to almost anything, and a yes you can't keep wastes a truck roll or a customer's week. This prompt answers only from the towns you list, asks for the street address when a place is on the edge, and turns a no into a polite, honest no without recommending a competitor it made up.
The prompt
Copy it into ChatGPT (or Claude, Gemini or Copilot) and replace every [BLANK] with your own details. It uses the four parts from Prompt Writing 101: Role, Context, Task and Format.
Role: You answer service area questions by email for [BUSINESS]. Context: Towns and areas we cover, and nothing else: [SERVICE AREA]. Edge cases we check by address: [EDGE RULES]. How to book: [HOW TO BOOK]. If the customer's town is not on the list, say plainly that we don't cover it. Don't name or recommend any other company. Task: Read the customer's email and write a reply that answers the area question first: yes with how to book, no with a short thank-you, or a request for their street address if the town is in the edge rules. Answer any other question only if the facts above cover it; otherwise say someone from the team will follow up. Format: Under 100 words, no subject line, friendly and plain. Sign off as "[SIGN OFF]". The customer's email: [CUSTOMER EMAIL]
Fill in the blanks
[BUSINESS]- Your company name and trade.
[SERVICE AREA]- Every town, ZIP code or county you serve, exactly as your office uses it.
[EDGE RULES]- Places you serve only partly, such as "Ridge Township: only south of Route 9." Write "none" if you don't have any.
[HOW TO BOOK]- What a customer in your area should do next, such as reply with their address and two times that work.
[SIGN OFF]- How the email is signed, such as "The Greenline team."
[CUSTOMER EMAIL]- The customer's message, without their phone number if they included one.
Example, filled in
A made-up example from the free lesson AI Email Responder: Draft Gmail Replies Automatically with n8n. Greenline Pest Control is the made-up pest control company in the AI Email Responder lesson, which serves Maple Grove, Cedar Falls and Brookside. The edge rule for Fairview is made up for this example.
Role: You answer service area questions by email for Greenline Pest Control. Context: Towns and areas we cover, and nothing else: Maple Grove, Cedar Falls and Brookside. Edge cases we check by address: Fairview, only the streets east of Mill Road. How to book: reply with your address and two times that work, Monday to Saturday, 8am to 5pm. If the customer's town is not on the list, say plainly that we don't cover it. Don't name or recommend any other company. Task: Read the customer's email and write a reply that answers the area question first: yes with how to book, no with a short thank-you, or a request for their street address if the town is in the edge rules. Answer any other question only if the facts above cover it; otherwise say someone from the team will follow up. Format: Under 100 words, no subject line, friendly and plain. Sign off as "The Greenline team". The customer's email: Hi, we just moved to Fairview and keep finding spiders in the basement. Do you guys come out this far? Also do you do mosquito spraying for the yard? Thanks, Owen
What a good answer looks like
- The area answer first: Fairview is partly covered, so the reply asks for Owen's street address.
- How to book, ready for when the address checks out.
- Mosquito spraying isn't in the facts, so the reply says someone will follow up instead of saying yes.
- No other pest company named or suggested.
How to check it before you use it
An AI draft can sound right and still say something you never told it. Use the habit from the Reply Faster lesson: check every promise, name, date and number against what you gave it before anything goes out.
- Check every promise against your list. A draft that says "yes, we cover Fairview" before seeing the address is the exact mistake this prompt exists to stop.
- Look for services the AI agreed to. Spiders are covered; mosquito spraying was never mentioned in your facts.
- Keep your area list current in one place. An old town list pasted into a prompt is a wrong answer you'll send for months.
- If you automate replies as drafts, as the lesson does, read the area line in every draft before sending.
Why this prompt works
Area questions are pure grounding: the right answer lives in one list, and the AI's job is to match a town against it. The lesson's agent does the same thing automatically, reading Gmail and saving a draft reply with the real towns and prices.
Practice it in the free lesson
AI Email Responder: Draft Gmail Replies Automatically with n8n: Build an n8n agent that watches your Gmail, reads each new customer email, and writes a reply as a draft in the same thread, ready for you to check and send. You do every step yourself in a practice copy of n8n, and nothing touches your real accounts.
Also useful: Reply Faster: Turn a Messy Customer Email Thread into a Clear, Friendly Reply
Terms used here
Related prompts
- "How much does it cost?" reply prompt: Answer a price question using only your published prices: what the first visit costs, what it includes, what changes the price…
- FAQ-based customer reply prompt: A ChatGPT prompt that answers customer questions only from your own FAQ and hands anything the FAQ doesn't cover to a person…
- Decline a request politely prompt: A ChatGPT prompt for saying no to a customer clearly and kindly: the no up front, one honest reason, a real alternative, and no…