# The Hard Part of Voice AI Is Not the Voice

Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-tech-trek-1219400/the-hard-part-of-voice-ai-is-not-the-voice
Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-tech-trek-1219400/the-hard-part-of-voice-ai-is-not-the-voice.md
Podcast: [The Tech Trek](https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-tech-trek-1219400)
Published: 2026-07-07T19:48:43+00:00
Episode link: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/thetechtrek/episodes/The-Hard-Part-of-Voice-AI-Is-Not-the-Voice-e3lpicn
Audio file: https://anchor.fm/s/1473c954/podcast/play/122521431/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2026-6-7%2F427537735-44100-2-a69d34e538298.mp3
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JSON: https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/the-tech-trek-1219400/episodes/the-hard-part-of-voice-ai-is-not-the-voice
Duration seconds: 1315

## Resource

Voice AI is moving from simple call routing into work that used to require trained human agents. The harder question is what happens when those conversations involve lending, collections, servicing, compliance, and real customer risk. In this episode of The Tech Trek, Amir Bormand speaks with Joshua March, founder and CEO of Veritus, about building AI voice agents for regulated financial services. Joshua shares why consumer lending is a demanding test case for voice AI, what makes regulated conversations different, and why the next version of the contact center may be built with much smaller teams overseeing AI systems. Practical takeaways AI voice agents only matter if they can actually resolve the issue. Joshua argues that users have been trained to distrust automated phone systems because most IVRs block progress instead of helping. Regulated communication is not just about what the agent says. It also includes who can be contacted, when they can be contacted, call frequency, TCPA rules, QA, and post call compliance. Complex voice agents require more than a prompt. Joshua talks about context engineering, state management, specialized background agents, compliance monitoring, KYC workflows, latency, and turn detection. AI changes startup execution. Small teams with experienced people can build and ship much more than before, but that also raises the pressure to move faster. Venture backed AI companies face a bigger bar. Joshua makes the case that higher seed valuations and larger funds increase the need for very large outcomes. Timestamped highlights 00:00, Why Veritus is focused on AI communications for financial services and voice agents in consumer lending 02:10, Joshua’s path from Facebook apps to social customer service, messaging, bots, and now voice AI 05:05,…

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