Work the inbox

The inbox is where your team works conversations from the chat widget and from email. This page covers the conversations Rin has handed to your team, or that a teammate took over. Approvals for refunds and cancellations are on their own page: see Approve actions.

Find a conversation

Click Inbox on the left. The sidebar next to it lists these views. On a phone, pick the view from the menu at the top of the list.

• Mine: open conversations assigned to you.
• Open: every open conversation, whoever it is assigned to.
• Rin: conversations Rin is still answering.
• Closed: finished conversations.

The number next to Mine and Open counts what is in it. In those two views, conversations under Waiting on us come first: the customer wrote last, so the next reply is owed by your team. Below them, Waiting on customer lists the ones where your team replied last.

Each row leads with the customer's first message. Below it are the customer's name and who wrote last or has the conversation. The time shows how long ago it was last active. Approval waiting means a request is waiting for a teammate to decide.

To narrow the list, use Tag, Priority and Assignee under Filter conversations. Click Load older at the bottom to see more.

Know who is responsible

A conversation's status says who responds next:

• Rin: Rin has it.
• Open: your team and their AI agents do.
• Closed: it is finished.

Every open conversation has an assignee, the teammate responsible for it. When Rin hands a conversation to your team, it picks the teammate with the fewest open conversations. When a teammate replies to a conversation Rin still has, that teammate becomes the assignee. Any teammate or AI agent can still reply to a conversation assigned to someone else.

Only owners can reassign. In the conversation's details, choose a teammate next to Assignee.

If you've turned on Email me when a conversation needs me under Settings > Profile, Rinhelp emails you when a conversation is assigned to you or a customer writes back, if you haven't opened it within a minute. AI agents are woken for these too. See Wake your AI agent.

Reply

Click a row to open the conversation. The history is in order: the customer's messages on the left, and replies from Rin, your team and AI agents on the right. Rin's sources show as links under its replies, and a line marks each handoff, takeover, close or reassignment. The details next to the messages show the assignee, priority, tags and the customer's email. On a smaller screen, click Details to see them.

• To reply, write in the Reply box and click Send, or press ⌘Enter (Ctrl+Enter on Windows). The customer sees it in the chat widget under your name, or by email. See Set up the chat widget and Set up email.
• If a reply by email doesn't arrive, the message shows Not delivered and the reason, with a Resend button when sending again could help.
• To tell your team something the customer must not see, switch to Note, write it and click Add note. Notes sit on gray with a line on their left, and only your team sees them. Rin's handoff summary is one of them.
• When the conversation is done, click Close. If the customer writes again, it opens again with the same assignee.

Set tags and priority

Tags and priority help you find and sort conversations. Rin sets them when it hands off.

• Tags: click + next to the tags, type a tag such as refund and press Enter. Click × on a tag to remove it. A tag is a free-form label, and the Tag list in the inbox shows the ones you already use. Reuse them rather than making near copies.
• Priority: choose Normal or Urgent next to Priority.

When a conversation has the Knowledge gap tag, Rin couldn't answer it from your knowledge. See How Rin answers for how to close the gap.

Look up a purchase

If an owner has connected Shopify or Stripe, the conversation's details show their lookups: Shopify and Stripe. Click Stripe to open it. They find the customer's purchases by their email, or by an order number, invoice number or receipt number.