Business phone system for home health care agencies in Illinois

The home health agency industry in Illinois

The Census Bureau counted 1,213 home health care agencies in Illinois in its 2023 County Business Patterns (NAICS 621610). They employed 35,809 people in mid-March and reported $1.6 billion in annual payroll. That is the 12th highest count among the 51 states and DC with published figures. Home health care agencies make up 0.38% of the 322,415 business establishments in the state.

Per 100,000 residents (2024 estimate) Illinois has 9.5 home health care agencies, 20.4% below the national rate of 12.0. The average establishment has 29.5 employees against 39.7 nationally. Payroll per employee is $45,363, 19.1% above the U.S. figure of $38,091.

Where home health care agencies in Illinois are concentrated

Census published home health agency counts for 19 metro or micropolitan areas that include part of Illinois. The largest is Chicago, IL-IN, with 1,101 establishments (a multi-state area; its count covers every state it spans). Single-state metro and micropolitan areas account for 8.3% of the statewide total; the rest are outside any published area or in areas Census suppressed.

Team sizes at home health care agencies in Illinois

35.4% of Illinois's home health care agencies with employees had fewer than five people in March 2023, compared with 35.7% nationally. 49.6% had fewer than ten. That is the size of team where a missed call usually means nobody was free, not that nobody was on staff.

What home health care agencies in Illinois use the phone for

Home health agencies coordinate clinicians in the field with patients, families, physicians and payers, so the office phone is a dispatch line as much as a reception desk. Clinicians need to make calls from their own cell phones without exposing personal numbers.

Typical inbound and outbound calls for home health care agencies in Illinois:

• A hospital discharge planner calls with a new referral.
• The office calls to confirm next week's visit schedule.
• A patient calls to report a missed visit.

After-hours calls

Agencies typically need an after-hours path to an on-call staff member, with routine messages captured for the morning.

Callata voicemail is transcribed and triaged for urgency, and business-hours routing decides where calls go once you close.

What a phone system costs a home health agency in Illinois

Home health care agencies in Illinois average 29.5 employees, so the comparison uses a 30-person team. Priced per seat, 30 users would run $900.00 a month on RingCentral RingEX Core and $748.50 on Ooma Office Pro (month-to-month list prices, checked September 28, 2026). On Callata the same 30 people cost $599.00 a month, less than either per-seat plan.

The annual difference against RingCentral's monthly list price comes to $3,612. Some vendors discount annual contracts; the table shows month-to-month prices.

Area codes in Illinois

Illinois has 17 geographic area codes in service according to NANPA. You can choose local numbers in the area codes your patients and families know, subject to carrier inventory, or port your current number for free.

How Callata works for home health care agencies in Illinois

Callata is a business phone system priced at $99 a month with 5 users included, then $20 per additional user. Callata Office includes up to 3 local business numbers, unlimited inbound calling, 1,500 pooled outbound US and Canada minutes per user each month, a browser softphone that can also ring your cell, voicemail with transcription, call recording with AI summaries, business-hours routing and E911 on every number.

If you already have a number in Illinois, porting it to Callata is free. Texting from a local number requires a one-time carrier registration (10DLC, $49), and the numbers available in any area code depend on carrier inventory when you choose them.

Optional AI agents (receptionist, sales, support or scheduler) can answer calls after hours or when nobody picks up, take messages, text, email and transfer to your team. They are billed from prepaid AI minutes at $0.25 per minute, identify themselves as AI, and may only place outbound calls to people who consented, between 8am and 9pm.

Practices that handle protected health information should review their own privacy obligations before recording calls, enabling AI summaries or texting appointment details, and keep clinical conversations out of text messages unless their policies allow it.