Chat and Email Related Tasks

Chat and Email Control Gadget

The Chat and Email Control gadget provides the following functionality:
  • Chat and Email state: The Chat and Email state is different from the Voice state that is displayed below the agent name. The following are the states:

    • Not Ready for Chat and Email:

      • You are set to this state by default when you sign in to the Cisco Finesse desktop.

      • If you refresh the browser, all the active chat sessions are cleared, email sessions are requeued, and you are moved to this state.

      • You can move to this state when you are not ready to handle chat and email.

    • Ready for Chat and Email: You can move to this state when you are ready to handle chat and email.

  • Time-to-accept counter: When you receive an incoming chat, the time counter is displayed and you must accept the chat within the specified time. If you do not accept the chat within the specified time, your state changes to Not Ready for chat and email.

  • Customer details: When an incoming chat arrives on your desktop, the customer details are displayed.

The buttons in the control area:

  • When an incoming chat request arrives, the Accept button, time-to-accept counter, and customer details appear for you to accept the chat.

  • When a new chat request is accepted, an orange icon appears on the top right corner of the chat bubble icon.

  • When you hover over the chat bubble icon, the number of active chat contacts appears.

  • When a new email contact arrives, an orange icon appears in the top right corner of the Envelope icon.

  • When you hover over the Envelope icon, the number of email contacts appears.

The number of chat and email alerts may appear incorrectly in case of any error.

Change Your State

When you sign in to the Finesse desktop, your state is set to Not Ready for Chat and Email by default.

If you are in Ready state, you can set your state to Not Ready.

To accept incoming chat and email contacts, you must set your state to Ready in the Chat and Email Control gadget.

Procedure

Step 1

Click the drop-down arrow beside your current state in the Chat and Email Control gadget.

Step 2

Select the appropriate state from the list.

Accept a Chat

When a customer initiates a chat session from a website, Unified CCX Web Chat:

  • Sends incoming chat to an available agent.

  • Plays an audio alert.

  • Displays contact details of the customer.

  • Prompts agent to accept chat before the time counter expires.

  • Sends incoming chat from Facebook Messenger to an available agent with a distinct icon that differentiates Facebook Messenger chat from a regular chat.

    • Only agents can end Facebook Messenger chats. Customers can't end chat.

    • Agent can't see typing indicator from the Facebook user. However, Facebook user can see typing indicator from the agent.

    • Facebook user sees the business entity name in the chat. Agent name is not displayed to the Facebook user.

    • Group chat is supported in Facebook Messenger chat, however Facebook user continues to see the business entity name.

You are presented with incoming chats until you reach the maximum active chat sessions that are set by administrator.

Procedure

Step 1

Click Accept in the incoming chat bar within the specified time to accept the chat.

The Manage Chat and Email gadget opens, chat session starts, and you are connected to the customer.

Note 

Repeat Step 1 when you are presented with a new incoming chat.

A new tab opens for the chat session and new chat session becomes the current session.

Step 2

To end the chat session, click End.

What to do next


Note

Customer can rate the chat experience. The chat rating is updated in an Activity (POD) in Context Service. The prerequisite is that the organization must be registered for Context Service.

Accept an Email

You must be in Ready state to receive an email contact. When an email contact arrives on your desktop, it is automatically accepted and an orange icon appears on the envelope on the Chat and Email Control gadget.

To view the contact, you must click the Manage Chat and Email tab to go to the Manage Chat and Email gadget. If you have more than one contact assigned to you, in the left panel, click the tab for the email contact that you want to view.

Manage Chat and Email Gadget

The following figure shows the Cisco Finesse Manage Chat and Email gadget for agents.



The Manage Chat and Email gadget allows you to manage chat and email contacts. Chat and email contacts that are assigned to you appear in tabs on the left. You can click each individual tab to view and reply to the contact.

Chat contacts are denoted by a chat icon. The following information appears on each chat contact tab:

  • Customer name

  • Total chat time: Indicates the duration of the chat session.

  • New message indicator: If you receive a message on a chat contact that is not your current contact, the tab flashes for a few seconds. A number appears on the tab that indicates how many messages the customer sent since you last replied.

Email contacts are denoted by an envelope icon. When you begin typing a reply to the email contact, a pencil icon appears on the envelope icon.

The following information appears on each email contact tab:

  • Customer information: Customer email address, customer name (if available).

  • Email timestamp: Indicates the time that the system received the email contact.

  • Email subject: Hovering the mouse over the email tab, displays the subject of the email in a tool tip.


Note

When you accept a chat request, Finesse automatically switches to the Manage Chat and Email tab and the chat becomes the active contact. When you are assigned an email contact, Finesse does not switch tabs and the contact does not become the active contact. An orange icon appears on the envelope icon in the Chat and Email Control gadget.

Chat Interaction Panel

The following figure shows the Chat Interaction panel of the Manage Chat and Email gadget.

Figure 1. Chat Interaction Panel

The Chat Interaction panel provides the following functionality:

  • Typing area: Type your message in the typing area. Right-click to perform basic clipboard operations, and to check spelling.

  • The typing awareness indicator shows when the other participant is typing.

  • Group Chat icon: Allow you to initiate a group chat with another agent or supervisor.

  • Group Chat invite appears for the agent to accept or decline the invite.

  • In Group Chat, an agent can click Leave to leave the group chat whenever required.

  • Predefined responses: Click to select a predefined response from the list. When you insert a predefined response, it is placed at the position of your cursor.

  • End chat session: Click End to end a chat session.

  • Customer details area: Click the drop-down arrow next to the customer details to minimize or maximize this area.

Initiate a Group Chat

You can initiate a Group Chat when you wish to involve another agent in an ongoing chat session to support the customer. This can be used for seeking further information or support for the ongoing chat. A group chat enables you to:

  • Send a chat invite to an available agent of the selected CSQ.

    The CSQ names are displayed with the number of available agents in that CSQ.

  • Enter the summary of the ongoing chat for the invited agent. This helps the invited agent to understand the context of the ongoing chat.

Figure 2. Initiate Group Chat Invite Interface

Procedure

Step 1

Click Group Chat icon to initiate a group chat with another agent or supervisor.

Step 2

Select a Queue from the list to invite any available agent to join the chat session.

Step 3

You may enter a summary of the chat in the Enter Notes text box. This helps the invited agent to know the context of the chat. This is optional.

Note 

The summary notes are visible only when the first agent enters the notes when the chat session was initiated.

The notes entered by the invitee is displayed only to the invited agent.

Step 4

Click Invite.

The available agent gets a notification to Accept or Decline the chat. When an available agent accepts the group chat, the three participants (the two agents and the customer) may exchange information in the chat window.
Step 5

To leave the chat session, click Leave.

When there is only one agent and the customer in the chat session, the chat can be ended by the Customer or the Agent by clicking End.

Accept a Group Chat

You will receive an incoming group chat notification on the Finesse desktop. You may see the notes of the ongoing chat along with the invite. This helps you to understand the issue for which the group chat was initiated by the inviting agent.

Procedure

Step 1

Click Accept when you see the new group chat notification to join the chat session.

The agent can see chat history upto 100 messages after joining the group chat.

Step 2

You may now exchange information with the other two participants (inviting agent and the customer).

Note 

  • The Group Chat icon is disabled till the time there are two agents in the ongoing chat. Only when one agent chooses to leave the chat session, the Group Chat icon will be enabled again. The agent who wishes to leave the chat session may choose to click Leave. The agent who is still active in the group chat session can initiate another group chat by following the steps detailed in the Initiate a Group Chat section.

  • The maximum number of participants in a Group Chat including the customer is three (3).

  • The notes are not persisted for any subsequent chat sessions with the same customer.

Decline a Group Chat

You will receive an incoming group chat notification on the Finesse desktop. You may also see a summary of the ongoing chat along with the invite. This will help you to know the issue for which the group chat was initiated by the inviting agent.

Procedure

Click Decline when you see the new group chat notification to decline the chat invite.

Note 

The agent who declined the group chat invite is not offered any successive group chat invites for the same chat session till another agent accepts a group chat invite for the same chat session.

Apply Wrap-Up Reasons for Chat and Email

Wrap-Up Reasons are the logical explanations that you can apply when you wrap up the chats and emails handled by you. If your administrator has assigned Wrap-Up Reasons for you, the Wrap-Up Reasons appear in the drop-down list that can be selected. If there are no Wrap-Up Reasons configured by the administrator, it appears blank.

Wrap-Up Reasons that your administrator modifies is available only to the new contacts and not for the contacts that you are currently handling.

Procedure

Step 1

Click Wrap-Up Reasons(0).

In a chat interaction panel you see the Wrap-Up Reasons(0) beside the End and in a group chat interaction panel beside the Leave. In an email reply panel, this is found beside the Send. The number in brackets indicates the count of Wrap-Up Reasons selected. This dynamically changes based on your selection.

Step 2

Select the appropriate Wrap-Up Reasons from the drop-down list.

Step 3

Click OK to close the Wrap-Up Reasons selection pane.

You can change your selection at any time. Click Wrap-Up Reasons(0); to open the Wrap-Up Reasons selection pane. You can select a maximum number of five (5) Wrap-Up Reasons.

Email Reply Panel

The following figure shows the Email Reply panel of the Manage Chat and Email gadget.

Figure 3. Email Reply panel


The customer email appears on the left. The area where you type the response appears on the right. After you begin your reply, Finesse automatically saves a draft of your message every 3 minutes.

Note

Do not close or reload the browser when you reply to an email or when the email loads on the desktop.

The Email Reply panel provides the following functionality:

Button

Name

Description

Requeue

Requeues an email contact to a new CSQ.

Discard

Discards an email.

Reply

Sends a reply to the email address of the customer.

Reply All

Sends a reply to the customer and to all other email addresses that the customer had included in the original email.

Cc

Allows to include other email addresses to send a copy of the email to them.

Bcc

Allows to include other email addresses to send a blind copy of the email to them.

Forward

Forwards an email to other email addresses.

Bold

Applies bold to the selected text.

Italic

Applies italics to the selected text.

Underline

Underlines the selected text.

Bulleted List

Inserts a bulleted list.

Numbered List

Inserts a numbered list.

Increase Indent

Increases the space between the left margin and the content.

Decrease Indent

Decreases the space between the left margin and the content.

Align Left

Aligns the content to the left margin.

Align Center

Aligns the content to the center.

Align Right

Aligns the content to the right margin.

Add/Edit Link

Creates or modifies a hyperlink of the selected text to the specified URL.

Add Image

Adds a specified image to your reply.

Attach a file

Attaches a specified file to the email reply.

Predefined Response

Inserts a predefined response into your reply.

Note 

If a Predefined Response is not configured, this button is disabled.

If the email is in Plain text format, this button is disabled.

Send

Sends your reply to the customer.

Reply to an Email Contact

Procedure

Step 1

On the Manage Chat and Email gadget, click the email contact that you want to reply to.

Step 2

Click Reply/Reply All to reply to the email address of the customer or to any other email addresses copied by the customer. You may modify or add email addresses in the To field. You may also include Cc and Bcc to include more email addresses by clicking the respective fields.

The maximum number of recipients allowed per field (To, Cc, and Bcc) is 20.

Step 3

In the Email Response area, enter your response to the customer.

You can use a predefined response or type your own response.
Note 

If you select a predefined response, then the existing content of the reply is overwritten by the predefined response text.

If Email Signature is configured, this is appended at the end.

Step 4

When you are finished, click Send.

Forward an Email

Procedure

Step 1

On the Manage Chat and Email gadget, click the email contact that you want to reply to.

Step 2

Click Forward to forward an email to add any other email addresses that you may want to send the email to. You may modify or add email addresses in the To field. You may also include Cc and Bcc to include more email addresses by clicking the respective fields.

Note 

  • The maximum number of recipients allowed per field (To, Cc, and Bcc) is 20.

  • No further attachments can be attached to the outgoing emails.

  • The Reply To field is modified appropriately such that the recipient of the forwarded email can reply to the original sender of the email directly and not send it back to the Contact Center.

  • The Requeue is disabled if you have initiated to forward the email. You must cancel Forward and click Reply/Reply All to requeue the email.

Step 3

In the Email Response area, enter your response.

You can use a predefined response or type your own response.
Note 

If you select a predefined response, then the existing content of the reply is overwritten by the predefined response text.

Email Signature is appended to the outgoing email as configured by the Administrator.

Step 4

When you are finished, click Send.

Download Customer Attachments

If a customer includes attachments in an email, the attachment filenames appear under the subject of the email. Finesse imposes the following limitations on customer email attachments:

  • The total file size limit in an agent's reply has been increased to 20MB.


    Note

    Images within the body of the email are counted as attachments.

  • The size limit of a single file attachment has been increased to 10 MB.

  • The total size limit of attachments in the incoming email from the customer has been increased to 20 MB.

Procedure

Step 1

Click the filename of the attachment you want to open or download.

You are prompted to open or save the file.
Step 2

Choose whether to open the file or save the file to your computer.

Step 3

Repeat Step 1 and Step 2 for each attachment that you want to open or download.

Add a Hyperlink to an Email

Procedure

Step 1

In your email reply, select the text that you want to turn into a hyperlink.
Step 2

Click the Add/Edit Link button.

A dialog box opens where you can enter the URL for the link.
Step 3

In the Please enter a URL to insert box, enter the URL for the link.

Step 4

Click OK.

Add an Image to an Email

Procedure

Step 1

Place your cursor where you want the image to appear.
Step 2

Click the Add Image button.

A dialog box opens where you can enter a URL for the image.
Step 3

In the Please enter a URL for the image box, enter the URL.

Step 4

Click OK.

The image appears inline in the email response.

You can also copy and paste an image into the email response.

Add an Attachment to an Email

You can add up to 10 attachments to an email reply to a customer. The following limitations apply:

  • The size of a single attachment must not exceed 10 MB.

  • The total size of all attachments must not exceed 20MB.

Procedure

Step 1

Click the Attach a file button.

Step 2

Navigate to the file that you want to send attach to the email.

Step 3

Click Open.

The file appears below the reply panel.
Step 4

Repeat Step 1 and Step 2 for each file that you want to attach (up to 10).

If you want to remove an attachment, click the X to the right of the attachment filename.

Requeue an Email Contact

You can transfer an email contact either to the same Contact Service Queue (CSQ) or to any other CSQ. After you initiate the transfer from the agent desktop, the contacts are requeued to a CSQ.

Last-agent email routing is a mechanism to route an email message to the agent who handled the last leg of the email conversation. When you requeue an email, the email will be routed to the intended CSQ to be handled by any available agent, and last-agent email routing is not considered.


Note

The requeued contact is not requeued to the same agent even if the agent is part of the requeued CSQ and is available to handle more contacts.

When you sign out or refresh your browser, any contacts that you were handling are disassociated from you and requeued to the same CSQ.

Procedure

Step 1

Select the email that you want to requeue.

Step 2

Click the Requeue button.

The list of CSQs is displayed with a search option.
Step 3

Type the CSQ name into the Search box to bring up the desired CSQ or select the CSQ from the list.

A confirmation dialog appears.
Step 4

Click Yes to confirm.

The email is removed from the multiple email sessions panel and requeued to the selected CSQ.

Discard an Email Message

Procedure

Step 1

On the Manage Chat and Email gadget, select the email message that you want to discard.

Step 2

Click the Discard button on the Email Reply panel.

You are prompted to discard the selected email message.

Step 3

Click Yes to confirm.

The email message is discarded.

When you discard an unsent reply that has attachments, the draft of the reply from the agent and the attachments are deleted. The original email message sent by the email contact remains in the Exchange mailbox.