Rules & Notifications: Using Instant and Time based rules to manage workflows
Helprace allows you to automate certain support tasks with business rules, keeping your ticketing process quick and efficient.
There are two types of business rules: instant and an time-based. They both work similarly as they react to changes in ticket conditions. An instant rule is designed to act on the change immediately. By contrast, time-based rules run repeatedly every hour, scanning the ticket database for conditions matching that rule.
- When do I use instant rules? When to use time-based rules?
- Instant rule example
- Time based rule example
Custom rules are supported in Helpdesk and Complete plans.
When do I use instant rules? When to use time-based rules?
Instant rules and time-based rules are both necessary to keep your support workflows up to speed. There is a difference between how instant rules and time-based rules work in Helprace.
Instant rules
Instant rules run every time a specific action is done to a ticket. instant rules scan ticket properties and execute an action when those properties match the ones defined in the rule.
Instant rules are useful when ticket changes require actions. instant rules can also perform actions on top of actions. For example, you may want to set up a instant rule that sends an email notification to a user. You may also want to email a specific answer to a user when a certain tag is set for a ticket.
All notification emails related to tickets are sent as a result of a rule.
Time based rules
Time based rules scan specific match in conditions every hour. If a match is found, the time based rule executes its action. For example, you may wish to close a ticket after a certain amount of inactivity. You may wish to send out email remainders to a certain party if a certain amount of time passes.
Before deciding whether to set up a instant rule or a time based rule, you must visualize your workflow first. Define what you want to accomplish and then consider if these require timed or immediate actions. For example, if you want to send an email notification informing the user their ticket was received, you will require a instant rule. If you want to send an email notification reminding the user that they haven’t responded to you in four days, you will require a time based rule.
By default, there are a number of pre-defined instant rules and time based rules in your Helprace. They are based on customer service best practices, but you can modify or disable them if you wish.
Instant rule example
The instant rule described below is designed to send an email notification to the requester if there a new agent reply to his ticket.
A requester is a ticket author or creator. In many cases it is your end-user. However, if a staff member typed in an end-user's email (ie user@example.com instead of their own in the requester field), the staff member will not be the requester.
So now that we're a bit familiar, let's take a look at our instant rule.
Go to Settings > Rules & Notifications. Select Instant and click to the right of the "Notify requester about public reply" in the list. Select Edit.
This is what happens inside Helprace when this instant rule is used:
Condition: When a new reply to a ticket is added by agent and it is a public reply (not an internal note), the action is executed.
Action: An email message with the ticket title and the latest comment in the body is sent to the requester and CCs (if there are any).
Time based rule example
The Time based rule in this example closes a ticket once its status has been set to Solved and not reopened in the last four days.
If you're unsure what a Closed ticket is, read about Ticket statuses
Go to Settings > Rules & Notifications. Select Time based and click to the right of the of a rule. Select Edit.
This is what happens inside Helprace when this time based rule is used:
Condition: Every hour this time based rule runs through all tickets. If the status of the ticket is Solved, the number of hours since it was solved is referenced. If the number of hours is more than 96 (4 days), the action is executed.
Action: The ticket status is set to Closed.
Important: Your "Meet ALL of the Following Conditions" & "Meet ANY of the Following Conditions" condition groups work on an AND basis, not an OR basis.
