Master Page

About Chats and Video Chats

Chat allows you to service online customer requests in real time. A customer clicks a URL link or a button on a web page to initiate a chat session. Clicking this button or link takes the customer to an entry point, from which the customer can begin chatting with an agent. An agent then responds to a customer’s query from the Advisor Desktop.

The customer may also click a link or button to initiate a video chat. With video chat, agents can see and talk with customers using a webcam and microphone and speakers, or a headset. Alternatively, a chat can be converted to a video chat if the agent servicing the chat has a video chat license. To successfully convert from a chat to a video chat, the agent must also not be working on more than one chat activity at the time.

During a chat or video chat activity, along with exchanging text messages, an agent can send web pages to a customer. In systems that have advanced collaboration capabilities, the agent can also share pages and cobrowse with customers.

Depending on the configuration of your system, some of the information a customer may share with you (birth dates, credit card numbers, etc.) can be masked to maintain confidentiality. Customers may also have the option of making their chat interactions go off-record in the event they need to share this sensitive data with the agent. While off-record, the chat transcript is not saved in the system. Customers can go back on-record if they wish to re-enable the masking of sensitive data.

Advisors can also invite other advisors and supervisors to a conference to help them service a customer.  Supervisors can also whisper in chats, which allows them to talk directly to advisors without alerting the customer of the supervisor's presence. 

Types of Chat Channels

There are multiple channels from where a chat activity can come. This includes the following:

  1. Web Chat
  2. An offer
  3. WhatsApp
  4. Apple Business Chat
  5. Direct messages from X
  6. Facebook Messenger
  7. SMS

Chat Activity Indicator

  • When a new chat activity is assigned to a queue, you have the necessary permissions to access, and you have not reached your chat activity limit, the Pull Chat button appears and blinks repeatedly until you pull the chat activity from the queue.

    new chat activity indicator

  • If you are in the Main tab of the Inbox when a chat session is in progress, and the customer sends a new message, the Chat tab indicator blinks and a pop-up notification appears. 

    new message indicator

  • If a new chat is assigned to the queue from which you can pull activities, and you are working on another application on your machine, the Advisor Desktop window pops to the front, and the Pull Chat button blinks.

Chat and Conference Status

You can see the status of all the open chat activities in the Inbox. The chat status is indicated using both descriptive text and color coding. The status of a chat can be one of the following:

view chat status

  • Waiting for response: This means the last message was sent by the customer to the agent. This is the default chat status when a new chat activity comes in to the inbox. This status is shown in gold with white text.

  • Waiting longest: To help the agent identify the chat that has been waiting the longest for a response, the Waiting longest message is shown in dark red with white text.

  • Waiting for customer to reply: This means the last message was sent by the agent to the customer. This status is indicate by a white check symbol in a green circle.

  • Customer not connected or Customer exited: This means that the customer has been disconnected from the system without actually ending the chat. This can be been caused by a network error or due to a problem with the browser. The status is shown in red text.

  • Reconnecting: If the Extended session timeout for customers setting has been configured, the customer may be able to reconnect with the agent after disconnecting. When this occurs, the status is shown in yellow.

  • Waiting for you to join the conference: This means that you have been invited to join a conference and assist another agent service a customer.

  • Whispering or joined the conference: The colors are similar to active interactions with chats, however the icon for the chat changes in the Inbox to identify that more than one advisor is handling the chat.

Wait Time Indication

  • The Time waiting for reply is displayed in the inbox for the chat activity to indicate how long it has been since the customer received a message from the agent or vice versa.

  • This clock is reset each time a message is sent. Also, a visual indicator highlights the chat activity that has been waiting the longest for the agent’s response.

  • The color of the Time waiting for reply column is changed to red and green when the chat status changes to Waiting for you to reply and Waiting for customer to reply respectively. 

    view Time waiting for reply

Chat Pushed Back to Queue

  1. Administrators can configure the system so that chats and video chats are automatically pushed back to the queue when the system detects that an agent has not started work on a chat activity in the inbox.

Related Topics