Auto-assignment hands conversations to your team in turns, so nobody has to pick them out of the Unassigned tab. You turn it on per inbox, and the agents in the rotation are that inbox's collaborators.
Turn it on or off
- Go to Settings → Inboxes
- Click Manage on the inbox you want to configure
- Scroll to the Collaborators card. Under Agent assignment, tick Enable auto-assignment
- Click Save
Untick the same box and save to turn it off. It is set per inbox, so you can use it on some inboxes and leave it off on others. New inboxes start with it off.
Who gets conversations
The rotation is the list of people in the Agents field of the same Collaborators card. To change who gets conversations, add or remove agents there and click Save.
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Collaborators only. An administrator who isn't a collaborator of the inbox can still see its conversations, but isn't in the rotation.
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Online only, by default. Agents whose status is Busy or Offline are skipped.
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Include offline agents. This checkbox appears once Enable auto-assignment is ticked. Tick it to assign to every collaborator whatever their status.
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In turns. The next conversation goes to the eligible agent who has gone longest without one. The rotation doesn't look at how much work each agent already has, apart from the limit below.
When it runs
Auto-assignment runs at the moment a conversation becomes Open and has no assignee:
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a new conversation arrives
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a Pending or Resolved conversation reopens
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the AI agent hands a conversation over
There is no waiting line. If nobody is eligible at that moment, the conversation stays in Unassigned and is not picked up later when an agent comes online. For the same reason, turning auto-assignment on doesn't distribute conversations that are already in the inbox. Assign those by hand or in bulk.
Bulk actions: resolve, assign or label many conversations at once →
Auto-assignment limit
In the Collaborators card, Auto-assignment limit sets the maximum number of conversations an agent can hold from this inbox. Leave it empty for no limit.
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What counts: conversations with the status Open, in this inbox, assigned to that agent. Pending and Resolved conversations don't count, and neither do other inboxes.
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At the limit: the agent is skipped until they hold fewer open conversations than the limit.
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Everyone at the limit: new conversations stay in Unassigned. They are not handed out later, so assign them by hand.
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Manual assignment is not blocked. You can still assign a conversation by hand, or take it by replying.
Availability status
Click your name at the bottom of the left sidebar to set yourself as Online, Busy or Offline.
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Mark offline automatically is on by default. While it's on, you count as online while Commslayer is open in your browser, and you go offline shortly after you close it. When you open Commslayer again, you're back on the status you picked.
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An open tab can keep you online. Your mouse and keyboard aren't tracked, so a Commslayer tab left open keeps receiving conversations while you're away from your desk. Set yourself to Busy or Offline, or close Commslayer, when you stop working.
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With Mark offline automatically off, you keep the status you picked, also after you close Commslayer. If you leave yourself on Online, you get conversations at all hours.
Administrators can change a colleague's status under Settings → Agents: edit the agent and set Availability.
When an agent is away
Conversations stay with their assignee when the agent goes Busy or Offline. Going offline only stops new assignments. When a customer replies to a Pending or Resolved conversation, it reopens with the same assignee, online or not.
Conversations can't be unassigned automatically when someone goes offline, and assignment can't follow a work schedule. What you can do:
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Days off: the agent sets their status to Offline, or an administrator sets it for them. Keep Include offline agents unticked.
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Hand a queue to a colleague: select the conversations in the list and reassign them in bulk.
One exception to "the assignee is kept": if the assignee isn't a collaborator of that inbox and auto-assignment is on, a reopened conversation moves to an eligible collaborator. This happens to administrators who take a conversation in an inbox they aren't a collaborator of. Add yourself as a collaborator to keep your conversations.
Assignment when you reply
This is a separate, account-wide setting: Settings → Account settings → Auto-assign on reply. It's on by default.
With it on, sending a reply assigns the conversation to you, also when it was assigned to a colleague. You can change the choice next to Send before you send. Private notes don't assign.
The two settings don't affect each other. Turning this one off doesn't stop inbox auto-assignment, and the other way round.
Send conversations to specific people
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Limit the rotation: add only the agents who should receive conversations as collaborators of the inbox.
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Everything to one agent: create a rule under Settings → Automations with the action Assign to agent. The agent must be a collaborator of the inbox, or an administrator.
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By label: a label that applies itself can assign with Assign an agent or Assign a team. This works with auto-assignment off.
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By team: when you assign a conversation to a team, Commslayer picks a team member for you if the team has Allow auto assign for this team. ticked under Settings → Teams.
To keep one person out of the rotation, remove them from the inbox's collaborators, or have them set their status to Busy or Offline. There is no per-agent switch for it.
When an agent leaves
When an administrator deletes an agent under Settings → Agents, all conversations assigned to that agent become unassigned. They are not redistributed. To hand them to a specific colleague, reassign them in bulk before you delete the agent.
Common problems
A conversation wasn't assigned to anyone
Nobody was eligible at the moment it arrived:
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No collaborator was Online, and Include offline agents is unticked
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Everyone online was set to Busy
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Every eligible agent had reached the Auto-assignment limit
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The AI agent is handling the conversation. Auto-assignment runs when the AI agent hands it over
Conversations keep landing on me
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You're a collaborator of the inbox and your status is Online
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You left a Commslayer tab open
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The inbox has Include offline agents ticked, so your status doesn't matter
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Mark offline automatically is off and your status was left on Online
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You replied, and Auto-assign on reply is on
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An automation rule or a label assigns conversations to you
I assigned a ticket to myself and it moved to someone else after the customer replied
You aren't a collaborator of that inbox. Add yourself under Settings → Inboxes → Manage → Collaborators.
Can older tickets be assigned first?
No. Conversations are assigned as they arrive. To work the oldest first, sort your list by Created at with Oldest first.
Sorting the conversation list →
Does auto-assignment work with the AI agent?
Yes. When the AI agent is on for an inbox, new conversations go to the AI agent first. Auto-assignment runs at the moment the AI agent hands a conversation over and the handover leaves it without an assignee. That is the case when Assign the conversation to in AI agent → Settings is set to Unassigned, or when the agent chosen there isn't a collaborator of the inbox. On chat channels the handover first looks for a collaborator who is online.