The "Snooze" button displayed in the agent's conversation panel is an alternative to permanently closing a conversation. The agents have the opportunity to put a conversation aside for a given period of time. The conversation will come back after this “snooze” period or as soon as the visitor sends a response. Depending on their availability, the agents have the option to remove a conversation from its snoozed state before the end of the predefined period of time.

1. Why snooze a conversation?

Even though it is usually more interesting to address and resolve visitors’ questions live, snoozing a conversation for a predefined period of time, or until visitors respond, will offer more flexibility to provide them with an answer. 

By shelving idle conversations the agents have more time to engage with other visitors, therefore the agents can also handle more conversations. 

A green or red dot, visible on each state box, indicates whether the visitor is still on or has left the website.

A green dot shows you that your visitor is still browsing your website

A red dot means that your visitor is no longer on your website 

2. How to snooze a conversation?

Click on the snooze button located in the top right corner of the conversation panel. 

Select the desired duration: 3 hours, 24 hours or custom. The ongoing conversation will disappear from the conversation panel. 

To snooze the conversation for a custom duration, select Until, enter a date and time and click on Continue to validate your choice. 

3. When should you snooze a conversation?

The green and red dots are indicators on when to use the snooze option during a conversation.

Here are some practical cases:

• An agent, working for a webshop, is advising a visitor who is about to buy a refrigerator

• Case N°1: the dot is red and there is no resolution so far
   

The visitor asks about the category of the refrigerator without providing further explanation. 
The agent provides the visitor with an answer on the energy class as they guess that it could be the visitor’s question. However they are not 100% sure that this was the meaning of the visitor’s question… 
At this point, a red dot lets the agent know that the visitor has left the website. The agent envisages that the visitor might return -visitor might just have been away- and that the initial request is not yet completely resolved. 
In such a case, the agent will not close the conversation for good.
The agent snoozes the conversation -here for 24 hours- to free up a conversation slot. Before proceeding, the agent will send a canned answer to inform the visitor.

• Case N°2: The dot is green , but the visitor is not responding and there is no resolution yet
  
  As the agent sees a green dot on the statebox, they know that the visitor is still on the website. 
  The agent asked the visitor if they are looking for a refrigerator combined with a freezer. 2 minutes have passed without any answer from the visitor, despite the fact the agent has been checking in. 
  Again here, the conversation cannot be seen as resolved and the agent could answer another visitor in the meantime. 
  The agent snoozes the conversation after letting the visitor know about it. 
  Nevertheless, the snooze duration can be shorter than for Case 1 as the visitor might just have been continuing navigating on the website. The agent will set a 15-minute snooze in order to assist another visitor. 
  After 15 minutes or if the visitor answers before that amount of time, the conversation will go back to an ongoing one. 
   
• Case N°3: The dot is green but the resolution is for later 
  
  The visitor is online and chats with the agent. The visitor would like to have an American style fridge in their new apartment but is not sure that it will fit. They forgot to measure the available space and will only go back to the place in 2 days. 
  In such a case, the visitor can’t make a decision right away. 
  The agent offers to snooze the conversation and explains to the visitor that they can resume it later by returning to the website on the same browser, or that they’ll receive an email notification if they have entered their email address.
  Once more, as there is no resolution during the ongoing chat, the agent won’t close the conversation. Conversation is snoozed for 48 hours to grant time for the visitor to come back with more information.
   

4. How to access snoozed conversations as an agent?

The "Keep assigning this conversation to me" box must be checked for the conversation and its details to be visible from the snoozed conversations tab.

5. Will the visitor be notified when a new message from an agent has been given?

Yes. There are two possible ways.

First one: the visitor will see the agent's response when they return to the website. A number on the reduced notification icon will give them the amount of new messages sent by the agents.

Second one: if the visitor has entered their email address in the chatbox, they receive an email notification when an agent replies and they have not read the message yet.

6. How to monitor the number of snoozed conversations?

The live activity report (or production report) displays how many conversations are currently on snooze. The amount of conversations closed during the day is also displayed on this report.

Click Reports > Advanced reports > Live activity > Snoozed.

To read the thread of a snoozed conversation, click on the “Read” button.

7. Auto-close snoozed conversations

If your administrator has enabled the Allow to automatically close inactive snoozed conversations option (Settings > Advanced settings > Agent settings, Snoozed conversations card), the Without a response from the visitor, close this conversation once the snooze duration is over checkbox is displayed when you snooze a conversation. It is checked by default: if you leave it checked, the conversation is closed if the visitor doesn't reply before the snooze period ends. Uncheck it if you don't want the conversation to be closed automatically.

Desktop experience                                                                                       Mobile experience

Your choice is saved in the browser (desk) or on the device (mobile app) you are using, not in your account: it is not carried over to another browser or device. On the same browser or device, it applies to all your next snoozes:

• If you don't change the checkbox status, snoozed conversations will continue to auto-close.
• Once you uncheck the auto-close checkbox, it will remain unchecked for all conversations until you manually recheck it.
• If you uncheck and then check the checkbox again, the status will remain checked.

If adding a tag is mandatory to close a conversation, add at least one tag to the conversation when the auto-close checkbox is checked. Otherwise, the Continue button is disabled and the message You must add a tag to allow the conversation to be closed once the snooze duration is over. is displayed. On the mobile app, snoozing is also impossible until a tag is added, with the same message.

If this is the first time you snooze the conversation with this checkbox, a popup will be displayed to warn you of the closing behavior.

On the desk, the Don’t remind me again checkbox hides this message for your next snoozes. It is checked by default. On the mobile app, there is no checkbox: the OK, don't remind me again button does the same:

Desktop experience                                                                                           Mobile experience

NB: Since the conversation is closed by the system and not by the agent, the closing message is not sent. In this case, it may be useful to warn the visitor (via a pre-recorded phrase, for example) that if no response is received, the conversation will be closed automatically, followed by the CSAT survey.

8. Best practices

• Always go for a live conversation when it’s possible
• Don’t check the “Keep assigning this conversation to me" box when about to go on vacation
• Check the conversation history when a conversation comes out of a snooze period to avoid asking the same questions all over again
• Don’t forget to set your status to unavailable before logging out. All your conversations must be snoozed or closed before you log out.