Hand-overs & follow-ups
Which chats it hands to your team as Human needed, how it steps back when your team replies, and the one follow-up it sends when a customer goes quiet.
The dress arrived with a torn seam 😕
✨ AI Agent
Hand to your team
It marks the chat "Human needed" in your Inbox and stays out of it until you hand it back.You decide which chats need a person. Anything you untick, it answers itself from what it knows — and anything it can't answer still comes to you.
An assistant that answers everything is one that eventually answers something it shouldn't. The agent's job is to answer what it can answer well, and to hand the rest to your team quickly and visibly — with the reason, and without making the customer repeat themselves.
What "Human needed" means
When the agent hands a chat over, the chat is marked Human needed in your Inbox, ahead of every other badge, and a bar above the reply box says The AI Agent handed this chat to you, with its reason. The thread also gets a note: "🙋 The AI Agent handed this chat to your team — …".
From then on it stays out of that chat. Replying doesn't clear the mark — Hand back to AI does, or marking the chat solved. Hand it back while the customer is waiting, and the agent answers them straight away.
The overview card on the AI Agent page counts Waiting for a person now — every Human needed chat nobody has solved yet — with a link straight to the Inbox.
Always handed to your team
Four kinds of chat always go to a person. They aren't settings.
A tap on a support button — Need support on a COD confirmation, say — is a customer asking for a person too, and hands the chat over.
The ones you choose
On the Rules tab, under Hand to your team. Each one ticked goes to your team; each one unticked, it answers itself — and still hands over if what it knows can't answer it. Use recommended puts them back to the defaults.
| Setting | Default | Unticked, it… |
|---|---|---|
| Damaged, wrong or missing items Something is wrong with an order they received. | On | Apologises once, asks for a photo of the problem and which item, and says the team will check. It never promises a refund, an exchange or a replacement. |
| Returns, exchanges and refunds They want to send something back, swap it, or get their money back. | On | Explains your return and exchange policy from what you've given it — never promising a refund or an exchange. |
| Cancelling or changing an order Cancel it, or change the address, size or items of an order already placed. | On | Explains what your information says about it and that the team will confirm. It never says the order was cancelled or changed. |
| Late or lost parcel complaints The parcel is late, lost, or the courier didn't come. | On | Gives the order's real status, courier and tracking, and apologises once for the wait. |
| Upset or angry customers Complaints and frustration, whatever the topic. | On | Answers what they asked. |
| Discounts and price negotiation They ask for a discount or try to bargain. | On | Answers only from what your information says about offers. It never invents or promises a discount. |
| Wholesale, collaborations and jobs Bulk orders, influencers, partnerships, job requests. | On | Answers what it can from your information. |
| Voice notes, videos and files Things it can't read. | On | Asks them, in a few words, to type the message instead. |
| "Where is my order?" Recommended off: it answers from the order's status and tracking. | Off | Gives the order's real status, with the courier and tracking when there are any — and when the parcel has a tracking page, a Track your order button under the message opens it (on WhatsApp, Messenger and Instagram). If it can't find the order, it asks for the order number, or the phone or email they ordered with. Any one is enough — so is the tracking number, Shopify's long order ID, or a screenshot of the order or shipping email: it reads the picture and looks the order up from what it shows. A number that isn't one of your orders, it says so and asks them to check it. |
| Which size fits me Recommended off: it answers from your size information when it has it. | Off | Answers from your size guide. With no size information, it hands over. |
Also hand over when… takes anything else, in your own words — "someone asks for custom sizes, or about orders over 5,000 EGP".
Telling the customer
Tell the customer a person will reply is on by default: when it hands over, the customer gets one short line in their language, with no promise of a time.
Always this line, never one the AI writes — so it can't promise "a few seconds" at 2am.
Untick it and the chat is handed over in silence; the customer's next reply comes from your team.
When your team is in the chat
When someone on your team replies in a chat, the agent steps back there for 12 hours. The chat shows AI paused — your team replied here, with a Hand back to AI button for when you're done.
If the customer writes again and nobody answers, it can step back in: it reads the whole chat, your team's replies too, and answers, asks, or stays quiet. It never contradicts your team. How long it waits is If a customer is left waiting for your team:
When your team is in the chat
If a customer is left waiting for your teamIn the app it's a dropdown. Day or night — a customer who writes at midnight isn't left until morning.
While a customer waits, the chat row says when it will answer — ✨ AI replies 14:30 — and the bar in the chat says the same, so whoever gets there first answers. In a Human needed chat it only answers their other questions: what it handed over stays with you. When it does step in, its Activity entry reads Stepped in for your team.
Never — wait for my team keeps it out of any chat your team has replied in for the full 12 hours.
Follow-ups
One message, once, when a customer goes quiet — always inside WhatsApp's 24-hour reply window, never at night. Each kind is its own switch with its own delay, from after 1 hour to after 20 hours after the agent's last answer.
| Follow-up | Default | What it says |
|---|---|---|
| Asked about a product, didn't order | On · after 3 hours | Asks if they're still interested and offers to take the order in the chat, in case ordering on your website didn't work out. Turn off Ask if they're still interested and offer to take the order here and it sends the link to order it, or helps choose a size instead. Sold out: asks if they'd like a message when it's back. |
| Was asked for order details, didn't send them | On · after 2 hours | A gentle reminder that the order is ready to place. |
| Got an answer, went quiet | Off · after 6 hours | Asks if there's anything else it can help with. |
A chat waiting for one shows ✨ AI will follow up. It's cancelled if the customer writes, orders, or your team replies, or if the chat is handed over. "Orders" means any order placed since their message that has the chat's phone number — or, for Messenger and Instagram chats and customers who check out with another number, the same first and last name. A follow-up that would land in quiet hours (02:00–11:00 in your store's timezone) waits until they end — and if that would be too close to the end of the reply window, it isn't sent at all.
What it leaves to your automations
Some messages in a chat aren't questions for the agent. It doesn't answer:
- Button taps on any of your automations' messages — Confirm, Cancel, Share My Location, a review or survey button. The automation that sent the buttons answers them. (A support button is the exception: it hands the chat to your team.)
- A typed "confirm" or "cancel" — تأكيد, إلغاء — while that customer's COD confirmation is waiting for an answer. The COD automation applies it to the order.
- STOP or إيقاف — the opt-out is handled for you.
- Location pins, stickers and reactions.
- A message an automation has already answered since the customer sent it.