/
Accepting an inbound chat

Accepting an inbound chat

Owned by Olesya Tantsyura
Last updated: Jan 11, 2025
4 min read

1. Description

Chats are displayed in the left panel under the chats tab.

There are such lists in the chat tab:

  1. Active chats;

  2. Self-assigned chats;

  3. Closed chats.

The presence of a blue circle in the tab indicates the presence of unaccepted chat(s).

1.1. Active chats

When chat is automatically allocated to an Agent, an audible alarm accompanies an inbound chat.

The following options for chat acceptance can be outlined:

  1. Automatic chat acceptance;

  2. Manual chat acceptance.

When a Contact is identified, the central block shows the full message history linked to that Contact. Chats from all connected messengers are visible. The Contact's information appears on the right block.

If several Contacts are found, the Agent chooses the Contact to link the chat to. After linking, the chat history of the selected contact is displayed.

The chat history displays all chats, regardless of which Agents participated in the conversation.

When hovering over the icon  located at the beginning of the conversation, the messenger icon and the chat gateway name of this conversation are displayed.

1.1.1. Automatic chat acceptance

In case of automatic chat acceptance, the chat received by the Agent is accepted as soon as it arrives — without clicking the acceptance button.

Set the variable wbt_auto_answer: true on the Variables tab of the Queue to automatically connect chat with the Agent (without the Agent clicking the Accept button). Self-assigned of chat must be switched off.

1.1.2. Manual chat acceptance

If automatic chat acceptance is not configured, chats are accepted by clicking the Accept button in the centre panel.

The presence of an unaccepted chat is indicated by a blue circle in the chat tab , if the agent is on a different tab.

Inbound chat is displayed in the left block, and the message history of this chat is displayed in the central block. To accept such a chat, click the Accept button in the central block (Fig.1).

Fig. 1. Inbound chat

1.2. Self-assigned chats

This list is displayed to all Agents of this Queue, i.e. any Agent can select any waiting chat for connection. If a chat has been accept by any Agent servicing this Queue, this chat is removed from this list (Fig.2).

Fig. 2. Inbound chats with manual distribution

Unlike automatic chat distribution, adding a new chat to the list of chats waiting to be connected to the Agent is not accompanied by a sound signal.

To accept a chat, you need to click the  button to the record of a particular chat.

The scale under the entry shows the waiting time of the Subscriber. The color changes depending on the percentage of the waiting time to the time entered in the Max wait time field of this Queue:

  • Green - < 50 %

  • Yellow - 51-75%

  • Red - 76% <

After accepting a chat, the central block opens the history of communication between the Subscriber and the chatbot, the ability to send a message to the Subscriber, and other options. 

After accepting a chat, it is listed in the Active chats section.

If self-assigned distribution is enabled, you can accept several chats. The maximum number of waiting chats is specified in the Max wait count field on this Queue's  Parameters tab.

3.3. Closed chats

Here, closed chats in which the Agent participated are displayed.

Only chats from the current day are displayed.

Reasons for closing the chat:

 — the Subscriber closed the chat;

 — the Agent closed the chat;

 — the response time expired.

Clicking on an entry opens the message history in the central block,

The list is sorted by the time the chat was closed, in descending order. The 10 most recently closed chats are displayed first. If there are more than 10 closed chats, a More button appears (Fig. 3). After clicking the More button, the next 10 closed chats appear.