Documentation / Working with tickets
Ticket locking and watch-only mode
In short: As soon as you open a ticket, it is yours: colleagues who open the same ticket are asked whether they want to take it over. They can go back, only watch, or take the ticket over from you. This way two colleagues never reply to the same customer at the same time.
Where to find this
Locking works automatically as soon as you open a ticket via Tickets. In the ticket overview you see the badge Ticket locked by on a ticket’s row, with the name of the colleague who has the ticket open.
Who: from the Agent role. Locking applies per ticket.
Opening a ticket a colleague already has open
If you open a ticket that a colleague is handling at that moment, a dialog appears with the text (name) is currently handling this ticket. Do you want to take it over? If the name is not known, it says Your colleague. The dialog has three buttons.
The dialog with the text (name) is currently handling this ticket. Do you want to take it over? and the buttons Return, Watch only and Take over.
| Option | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Return | You go back to the ticket overview. The ticket stays with your colleague. |
| Watch only | You open the ticket in watch-only mode: you see the conversation and the customer context, but all buttons and the editor are disabled. You cannot reply, change the status or labels, or assign anything. |
| Take over | The ticket is taken from your colleague and you can work on it. You see the message You have successfully taken over the ticket from (name). |
If you close the dialog in another way, you end up in watch-only mode.
What your colleague sees when you take over
The colleague who had the ticket automatically goes into watch-only mode and sees the message The ticket is now being handled by (name). That colleague then gets the same dialog with Return, Watch only and Take over, and can therefore take the ticket back again. Agree on this briefly in the internal chat if it is unclear who will finish the ticket.
If taking over fails, you see Sorry, the takeover failed… Then try again.
Getting to work from watch-only mode after all
If you are in watch-only mode and your colleague closes the ticket (for example by going to the overview), the ticket is automatically given to you. The buttons and the editor then become active without you having to do anything. If the dialog was still open, aishaa automatically chooses Take over at that moment.
The same applies the other way round: if you open a ticket and a colleague starts on it just before you, you see (name) has just started handling this ticket. and you end up in watch-only mode.
Messages about assignment
Locking is about who has the ticket open at this moment. That is different from the Assigned agent on the ticket. When the assignment changes, you get these messages on the open ticket:
| Message | When |
|---|---|
| Someone has assigned this ticket to you. | A colleague assigns the open ticket to you. |
| (name) has claimed this ticket. | A colleague assigns the ticket to themselves or someone else while you have it open. |
| (name) has taken over this ticket from you. | The ticket was assigned to you and has now been assigned to a colleague. |
| Someone removed you from this ticket. | The assignment to you has been removed. |
| Attention! Another agent is already assigned to this ticket. | You open a ticket that is assigned to a colleague. |
See Assigning, support group, important and urgent for the assignment itself.
Good to know
- Locking is tied to the open ticket screen. If you go back to the overview or open another ticket, the ticket becomes available to colleagues.
- In watch-only mode you do see live what happens: new messages, status changes and labels appear immediately.
- In the ticket overview the Ticket locked by badge shows who has a ticket open. This lets you choose another ticket instead of waiting.
- If the live connection is temporarily unreliable, the ticket shows a warning about it and most buttons are also disabled. That is not locking; it recovers by itself as soon as the connection is back.
- There is no setting to switch off locking or to let several colleagues work on one ticket at the same time.