Handling conversations
When the AI hands a chat off to a person, it lands in your Inbox. This is where your team picks up escalations, replies to customers live, and closes them out.
Everything updates in real time, so you rarely need to refresh.
The queue
Open the Conversations tab to see the Inbox. Each escalation shows up as a card with:
- The customer's name.
- A language badge, so you know what language to expect before you open it.
- The time of the last activity.
- On a waiting (unclaimed) conversation, a small message count when the customer has sent more than one message since the handoff, so you can spot who has been waiting with a pile-up of unanswered replies.
New escalations arrive on their own. The moment the AI hands off, the card:
- Appears at the top of the queue.
- Briefly highlights with a pulsing marker.
- Plays a short chime, so you notice it even when you're looking elsewhere.
No refresh needed.
Above the list you can filter the queue:
- All: every open conversation.
- Waiting: escalations no one has claimed yet.
- Mine: conversations assigned to you.
- Resolved: recently closed conversations.
Start your shift on the Waiting tab so you only see what still needs a human. Switch to Mine to focus on the conversations you've already claimed.
If you're an owner or admin, you'll also see a Handled by AI panel at the top of the queue. It lists the conversations the AI is answering right now, so you can keep an eye on live activity.
These need no action. They only move into the queue if the AI escalates them.
The handoff summary
Every escalated card carries an AI summary, a short written handoff the AI prepares before it steps back. It captures:
- What the customer wants.
- What they've already tried.
- The tone of the conversation.
This lets you start helping without reading the whole transcript first.
The summary is the most useful thing on the card, so read it first. If it's long, expand it with Show more to see the full handoff before you open the conversation.
The card also shows the escalation reason (for example, "Refund request") and a preview of the customer's last message, so you can triage at a glance.
Claiming a conversation
A waiting conversation is unassigned, so anyone on the team can take it. Open it and choose Claim conversation, or use Claim Ticket straight from the card. It's one click.
Once you claim, the conversation becomes yours. The change is broadcast live, so:
- Other agents immediately see it as assigned to you and won't double-up.
- The customer is told they're now chatting with a person.
Unread on claimed chats
When a customer replies on a conversation you have claimed but are not looking at, IteroChat marks it unread:
- A count badge on the conversation card (capped at 9+).
- A count in the browser tab title (uncapped).
- The same sound chime used for new escalations (unless you muted sound).
- A browser desktop notification for that thread (unless you turned message alerts off).
Open the thread on Conversations while the browser tab is visible (or return to a visible tab that already has it open) to clear unread. Leaving Conversations stops counting that thread as viewed, so later customer replies accrue again. Clicking a new-message desktop notification opens that conversation.
Agents: use the mute and bell controls in the Inbox header. Owners and admins can also change the same preferences under Settings → Notifications. Browser notification permission must be granted for desktop alerts. Escalation push to a closed browser is separate from these new-message alerts.
Replying
After you claim, the reply composer appears at the bottom of the conversation. Type your message and send it with Enter or the send button (Shift+Enter for a new line). It goes out over the live connection, so the customer sees it instantly. There's no send delay or page reload.
Use Attach to add images, videos, audio, or documents from the composer. You can send a caption with the files, or send media alone with no text. Supported types match the platform allowlist: JPEG, PNG, GIF, and WebP images; MP4, WebM, and QuickTime video; MP3, Ogg, and M4A audio; PDF, plain text, CSV, DOC, and DOCX. On Meta channels (WhatsApp, Messenger, Instagram), delivery follows what that channel allows for outbound media.
While you type, the customer sees a typing indicator, the same way you'd expect in any chat app. Their replies stream into the transcript in real time.
Customer, AI, and agent messages are styled differently in the transcript, so it's always clear who said what. When the AI's earlier answers cited knowledge base documents, those sources are shown under the message.
When a customer sends a file, you can open it right in the transcript. Click an image, PDF, or text file to preview it in place, without downloading anything. The preview has a download button if you want to save a copy. Other file types (for example Word or Excel documents) download instead of previewing.
Type / in the composer to pull up your team's saved quick replies. Pick one to drop the full text in, then edit before sending. Quick replies are great for greetings, common answers, and closings: your team configures them once and everyone reuses them.
AI-suggested replies
When you are replying to a customer, you do not have to start from scratch. Select Suggest reply in the composer and the AI drafts a response for you, using your knowledge base and your AI instructions, in the customer's language.
The draft lands in the composer as editable text. Nothing is sent automatically: read it, adjust anything you want, and send it like any other message, or clear it and write your own. It gives you a fast, on-brand starting point, especially for the questions you answer most often.
Anyone working a conversation can use it (owners, admins, and agents). Generating a suggestion draws on your plan's usage the same way an AI reply does, since the AI is doing the same work. See Plans and usage.
Resolving
When the customer's issue is handled, choose Resolve. That closes the conversation in one click and locks it, so no more messages can be sent on either side.
After a conversation is resolved, the customer may leave a rating. When they do, the following appear on the resolved conversation, so you can see how the interaction landed:
- Their star ratings (one for the AI and one for the agent).
- Any written comment.
Transferring a conversation
If you are handling a conversation and someone else is better placed to help, you can transfer it to a teammate. Open the conversation, choose Transfer, pick the teammate (their availability is shown), and optionally add a note with context for them. The teammate picks the conversation up right away, your note is saved as an internal note on the conversation (the customer never sees it), and the customer simply sees that they are now chatting with the new teammate. Owners and admins can transfer any active conversation; agents can transfer the conversations assigned to them.
Internal notes
Every conversation has a space for internal notes: private remarks only your team can see. Open a conversation and use the notes panel below the transcript to capture context, such as what you found, what you already tried, or a reminder for whoever picks it up next.
Notes stay strictly private:
- The customer never sees them, in the chat or anywhere else.
- They are kept separate from the conversation and are never used by the AI to answer.
Add a note with Cmd/Ctrl + Enter or the Add note button. Each note records who wrote it and when. Notes cannot be edited once saved, which keeps them dependable as a record; if a note is wrong, delete it and add a fresh one. You can delete your own notes, and owners and admins can delete any note on their team.
Website visitor context
When someone starts a chat from the website widget, the conversation shows where they are (from their IP address), their local time, browser and device, the page they were on, and any campaign tags already on that URL. This is only for website chats. WhatsApp, Messenger, and Instagram conversations do not have this panel.
On a wide screen, a Visitor rail sits to the right of the transcript. You can drag its left edge to resize it, or hide it with the icon in the rail header. When it is hidden, a compact line under the contact name (and an icon next to the conversation menu) brings it back.
On a smaller screen the same details live in a Visitor tab below the transcript, next to Internal notes. The compact line under the contact name opens that tab.
The compact line is also shown when you open a past conversation from history. See Data & privacy for what is stored and how a permanent erase treats it.
Search and history
The live queue only shows open and recently-handled conversations. To find anything else, use Search past conversations above the queue. You can:
- Search by name, email, or phone.
- Filter by status: all, queued, assigned, or resolved.
- Page through the results.
This is how you reopen an earlier conversation to review what was said, check a previous resolution, or follow up on a returning customer.
You can also organize conversations with tags. Open a conversation and add tags from the picker at the bottom. They're saved immediately and help you label and group conversations for later.
Notifications and availability
New escalations alert you so you don't miss a handoff:
- A short audio chime while the dashboard is open.
- A device notification that reaches you even when the dashboard is closed or in another tab, on your computer or your phone.
Device notifications are on by default. The first time you sign in, your browser asks you to allow notifications, and once you do, this device is set up automatically. Owners and admins can turn them off or back on for their device in Settings → Notifications (if your browser has blocked notifications, that is shown there too, with how to allow them again).
If browser notifications are not enough for sensitive chats, owners and admins can also configure outbound webhooks in Settings → Notifications (Outbound webhooks section). Webhooks POST signed JSON to a URL you control, so you can route escalations into paging, on-call, or internal tools outside the dashboard.
Agents: use the mute button and bell control in the Inbox header for sound and new-message desktop alerts. Owners and admins can also change those preferences in Settings → Notifications. Your choices are remembered on that device.
Your availability is set from the status switch at the bottom of the sidebar:
- Flip it to Available when you're ready to take conversations.
- Flip it to Offline when you step away.
Your team's metrics reflect how many agents are currently available.
Device notifications, notification permission, mute, and new-message desktop alert preferences are per-browser and per-device. If you move to a different computer, you may need to allow notifications again there.