Accept email interactions

8x8 Contact Center directs emails to agents via an email queue. AgentAgents use the Agent Console to view and manage customer interactions. Virtual Contact Center supports Regular agents and Supervisor agents. status must be Available to receive these incoming emails. When an incoming email is offered to an agent, the Email tab blinks, indicating an incoming request. The agent can accept, or if permitted by administrators, reject the request. On accepting, the agent's status changes to Busy. On rejecting the email, the agent's status changes to Working Offline.

Prerequisites

To receive emails, an agent must be:

• In the Available state.
• Assigned to an enabled email queue.

  Note: You can view or edit your queue assignments in the Agent Profile. For details, refer to View Your Assigned Queues.

If an email queue has pending emails, you can:

• Pull all queued emails at once.
• Accept one email at a time.

  Notes:
  - Pulling emails is a privilege given by the administrator in Configuration Manager.
  - You cannot receive emails (including attachments) larger than 30 MB via email channels.

Pull emails

In 8x8 Contact Center, pulling emails from a queue gives you the flexibility to quickly look at the sender or the subject of the email, and then accept an email that requires the most immediate attention. The Status tab in the Control Panel lists your email queues, and indicates the number of emails pending in a queue.

To pull emails from a queue:

1. In 8x8 Agent Console8x8 Contact Center's browser-based graphical user interface (GUI) used by Agents to manage customer interactions., set your status to Working Offline.
   If your status is Available, 8x8 Agent Console may offer you a new interaction before you can complete pulling email interactions from an email queue.
2. Go to the QueueA queue is an ordered collection of interactions waiting to be served by agents qualified to respond to these interactions. In addition to enabling the call center administrator to customize how incoming interactions are prioritized and routed, queues also ensure that interactions are never lost or discarded. tab in the Control Panel.
3. Click Pull or click the number of emails.
   
   8x8 Agent Console pulls all emails from the queue, and presents the list in the Display Panel. Change the order of emails by clicking the column heading. You can sort by wait time, case or follow-up number, email channel, contact name, name of the company, or the email subject.
   

   Note: If your 8x8 Contact Center administrator has given you the permissions to delete, you can identify unwanted emails from the list of pending emails, select, and delete them. To delete emails, see Delete Emails from a Queue.

4. Check the sender and/or subject of the email, and click under the Subject column of an email you wish to open.
   The email is offered to you instantly. The email tab blinks red. The work flow is the same as accepting an email.
   
   If the email is from an existing customer, a relevant case or customer record pops up for preview as well.

   Note: If you have multiple emails opened in tabs, the screen pop tab, which displays the case number and customer name, helps you navigate better.

   Note: If the screen pop fails to open, clean up your browser cache and cookies and log back in.

5. Click Accept Email.
   Your status changes to Busy. The email creates a case, and opens in a new tab.

   Note: The Reject interaction button is disabled if your contact center administrator has not granted the permission. This prevents agents from rejecting the interactions they are offered.

6. Your status changes to Post Processing, and then back to Work Offline. The email saves as a case in the Open state, and is assigned to you.
   You can edit case details, reply, or create a new follow-up.
   • To edit, click Edit. Read more In the edit mode, you can change case details such as the status, priority, severity, subject, and more. Select Notify to notify another colleague or the customer about case details. For more details on editing case records, see Create and Edit Case Records.
     
   • To reply, click Reply. Read more In the reply mode, you can respond to the customer email, or insert case details, attachments, or content from FAQ knowledge base. The case information (original email) is attached automatically.
     
   • To create a new follow-up, click New follow-up. Read more You can create a new follow-up, respond to the customer email, or insert case details, attachments, or content from FAQ knowledge base. The follow-up record does not include the original email.
     

Accept one email at a time

To accept one email from the queue:

1. Change your status to Available.
   If you have an incoming email, the Email tab in the Control Panel blinks red. If the incoming email is from an existing customer, the customer record pops up for preview.
   
2. Preview the customer or case data, and click Accept Email.
   Your status changes to Busy. The email creates a new case or follow-up record, and opens in a new tab. The screen pop tab that presents the email displays the case ID and customer name.
   

   Note: If you have multiple emails opened in tabs, the screen pop tab, which displays the case number and customer name, helps you navigate better.

   Note: If the screen pop fails to open, clean up your browser cache and cookies and log back in.

3. Your status changes to Post Processing, and then back to Available.
   The email saves as a case or follow-up in the Open state, and is assigned to you. You can edit case details, reply, or create a new follow-up.

See Also