Fundamentals for support agents
Fundamentals for support agents covers day-to-day Inbox work: replying, internal notes, assignment, snoozing, tagging, macros, and taking over from Fin.
Core rules
- Reply vs note. A reply goes to the customer; a note is internal. Use notes for context, investigations, and handoff details, not for customer communication.
- Use the customer profile. Check plan, location, previous conversations, and attributes before answering account-specific questions.
- Take over cleanly from Fin. Read Fin's summary and transcript; do not repeat questions already answered. Confirm what Fin told the customer before correcting it.
- Assign and mention deliberately. Assign ownership when you will act; mention a teammate only when their action is needed. Mentions notify; they do not transfer ownership.
- Snooze with a reason. Snooze pending customer replies or internal dependencies, then close only when the issue is resolved or handed off.
Worked example
Fin escalates a billing dispute. The agent opens the conversation, reads Fin's summary ('customer charged twice; requests refund'), checks the customer's plan and invoice, replies with a macro explaining the refund timeline, tags 'billing-refund', notes the invoice ID, snoozes until the finance team confirms, then replies and closes.
Traps
Putting customer-facing text in a note; closing before confirmation; using tags inconsistently; snoozing without a follow-up trigger; and failing to correct inaccurate Fin answers.