---
title: "Receptionist and Information Clerk"
description: "Answer inquiries and provide information to the general public, customers, visitors, and other interested parties regarding activities conducted at…"
canonical: "https://nuecareer.com/careers/receptionist-and-information-clerk"
last-updated: "2026-08-23T15:56:39.581Z"
---

# Receptionist and Information Clerk

**Category:** Office and Administrative Support · **SOC code:** 43-4171 · **O\*NET-SOC code:** 43-4171.00

Answer inquiries and provide information to the general public, customers, visitors, and other interested parties regarding activities conducted at establishment and location of departments, offices, and employees within the organization.

Also advertised as: Clerk Specialist; Front Desk Receptionist; Greeter; Information Assistant (Info Assistant); Medical Receptionist; Member Services Representative (Member Services Rep); Office Assistant; Receptionist.

## At a glance

- **Median annual wage:** $38,010 (BLS OEWS, May 2025)
- **Median hourly wage:** $18.27/hr
- **Wage range (10th–90th percentile):** $28,760 to $49,950, with the middle half between $33,960 and $45,130
- **Total US employment:** 910,180
- **Typical entry education:** High school
- **Preparation required:** Little or no preparation — O\*NET rates this "Job Zone 1-2: Very Little to Some Preparation Needed"
- **Projected growth:** 0.0% over 2024–2034 (BLS EP, 2024–2034)
- **Annual job openings:** 128,500 openings a year
- **AI-resilience score:** 31/100 — a NueCareer heuristic over O\*NET work activities and context, not a BLS or O\*NET figure

## Pay

National wage distribution, BLS OEWS, May 2025, across 910,180 US jobs.

| Percentile | Annual wage |
| --- | --- |
| 10th | $28,760 |
| 25th | $33,960 |
| 50th (median) | $38,010 |
| 75th | $45,130 |
| 90th | $49,950 |
| Mean (average) | $39,460 |

### Pay by state

The 15 highest-paying states, by median annual wage. The cost-of-living-adjusted column divides the state median by that state's BEA Regional Price Parity, so the columns answer different questions: the first is what the job pays there, the second is what that pay buys there.

| State | Median annual wage | Cost-of-living adjusted | Employment |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| DC | $49,060 | $44,640 | 2,000 |
| AK | $44,720 | $43,689 | 1,530 |
| WA | $44,710 | $41,780 | 26,500 |
| CA | $44,100 | $39,830 | 82,470 |
| MA | $43,870 | $41,482 | 18,970 |
| NY | $43,080 | $39,918 | 65,010 |
| RI | $42,620 | $41,670 | 4,270 |
| ME | $42,440 | $43,730 | 3,440 |
| CO | $42,010 | $40,766 | 11,020 |
| NJ | $41,650 | $38,279 | 42,060 |
| HI | $41,600 | $37,835 | 3,510 |
| WI | $41,150 | $43,732 | 25,580 |
| OR | $40,900 | $39,570 | 13,590 |
| CT | $40,630 | $39,214 | 14,980 |
| ND | $39,530 | $44,436 | 1,930 |

39 more states with published wage data are omitted here. The full table for all 54 states is at https://nuecareer.com/careers/receptionist-and-information-clerk/salary-by-state, or as JSON at https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/receptionist-and-information-clerk.

## Outlook

BLS projects employment to move from 1,007,200 in the 2024–2034 base year to 1,007,600 by the end of the cycle — a gain of 300 jobs, or 0.0%. Slower than average: 0.0% against 3.1% projected for all occupations over the same cycle. About 128,500 openings a year are expected on average, counting openings from growth as well as from workers leaving the occupation permanently. Source: BLS EP, 2024–2034.

## How to get in

- **Typical entry education:** High school diploma or equivalent (BLS Employment Projections).
- **Preparation level:** Little or no preparation — O\*NET's preparation band for this occupation is "Job Zone 1-2: Very Little to Some Preparation Needed".
- **Related work experience typically required:** None.
- **Typical on-the-job training:** Short-term on-the-job training.

### Education people in this job actually hold

O\*NET surveys incumbents, so this distribution describes who is in the job today and can differ from the BLS entry requirement above.

| Education level | Share of workers |
| --- | --- |
| High School Diploma | 49.5% |
| Some College Courses | 25.7% |
| Post-Secondary Certificate | 20.9% |
| Associate's Degree (or other 2-year degree) | 3.7% |
| Less than a High School Diploma | 0.3% |

## What the work involves

- Greet persons entering establishment, determine nature and purpose of visit, and direct or escort them to specific destinations.
- Operate telephone switchboard to answer, screen, or forward calls, providing information, taking messages, or scheduling appointments.
- Transmit information or documents to customers, using computer, mail, or facsimile machine.
- File and maintain records.
- Provide information about establishment, such as location of departments or offices, employees within the organization, or services provided.
- Hear and resolve complaints from customers or the public.
- Collect, sort, distribute, or prepare mail, messages, or courier deliveries.
- Perform duties, such as taking care of plants or straightening magazines to maintain lobby or reception area.

## Skills and knowledge

### Essential skills

- Speaking — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Listening — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Reading Comprehension — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Critical Thinking — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Writing — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Monitoring — importance 2.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Learning — importance 2.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Learning Strategies — importance 2.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Transferable skills

These are the skills that carry into other occupations, and they drive the related-occupation and career-change rankings on this site.

- Service Orientation — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Social Perceptiveness — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Coordination — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Time Management — importance 2.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Complex Problem Solving — importance 2.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Persuasion — importance 2.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Instructing — importance 2.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Judgment and Decision Making — importance 2.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Knowledge areas

- Customer and Personal Service — importance 4.2 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Administrative — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- English Language — importance 3.7 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Computers and Electronics — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Mathematics — importance 2.7 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Public Safety and Security — importance 2.7 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Abilities

- Oral Expression — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Oral Comprehension — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speech Recognition — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speech Clarity — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Comprehension — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Expression — importance 3.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

## Who it suits

O\*NET rates every occupation on the six Holland (RIASEC) interest areas, on a 1–7 scale. This occupation's strongest areas are Conventional (C), Enterprising (E), Social (S).

| Interest area | Score (1–7) |
| --- | --- |
| C — Conventional | 6.30 |
| E — Enterprising | 4.26 |
| S — Social | 3.57 |
| R — Realistic | 1.95 |
| I — Investigative | 1.79 |
| A — Artistic | 1.10 |

### Personality fit

These scores are **derived by NueCareer**, not published by any government agency: they are cosine similarities between a personality type's trait profile and this occupation's O\*NET interest and work-style ratings, expressed 0–100. Treat them as a starting point for exploration, not as evidence that a type belongs in a job.

| Type | Fit score (0–100) |
| --- | --- |
| ESFJ | 84.5 |
| ESTJ | 80.6 |
| ISFJ | 76.1 |
| ISTJ | 65.2 |
| ENFJ | 60.0 |

Best-fitting types: ESFJ, ESTJ.

## Related occupations

O\*NET's primary related occupations, in its own ranked order.

- [Medical Secretary and Administrative Assistant](https://nuecareer.com/careers/medical-secretary-and-administrative-assistant) — median $45,930
- [Office Clerk, General](https://nuecareer.com/careers/office-clerk-general) — median $45,010
- [Customer Service Representative](https://nuecareer.com/careers/customer-service-representative) — median $44,770
- [Secretary and Administrative Assistant, Except Legal, Medical, and Executive](https://nuecareer.com/careers/secretary-and-administrative-assistant) — median $47,540
- [Switchboard Operator, Including Answering Service](https://nuecareer.com/careers/switchboard-operator) — median $38,630
- [Interviewer, Except Eligibility and Loan](https://nuecareer.com/careers/interviewer) — median $45,920
- [Executive Secretary and Executive Administrative Assistant](https://nuecareer.com/careers/executive-secretary-and-executive-administrative-assistant) — median $76,590
- [Counter and Rental Clerk](https://nuecareer.com/careers/counter-and-rental-clerk) — median $41,300
- [Patient Representative](https://nuecareer.com/careers/patient-representative) — median $50,290
- [Correspondence Clerk](https://nuecareer.com/careers/correspondence-clerk) — median $46,800

## Sources

- **O\*NET** — O\*NET 30.3 Database, May 2026. https://www.onetcenter.org/database.html
- **BLS OEWS** — BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. https://www.bls.gov/oes/
- **BLS EP** — BLS Employment Projections, Table 1.2, 2024–2034. https://www.bls.gov/emp/
- **BLS OOH** — BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2024–2034 edition. https://www.bls.gov/ooh/
- **BEA RPP** — BEA Regional Price Parities by State, 2024. https://www.bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metro-area

---

This bank includes information from the O\*NET 30.3 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). O\*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. NueCareer has transformed the data by joining it to BLS wage and projection data and deriving facet, personality-fit and AI-resilience scores. BLS and BEA data are public domain (17 U.S.C. §105).

O\*NET content is used under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). How these figures are sourced and derived: https://nuecareer.com/careers/methodology

JSON representation of this page: https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/receptionist-and-information-clerk