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Give the agent an email address

Switch the email channel on and the agent is given its own address. Forward your support inbox to that address and the agent answers what arrives, in the same voice and from the same knowledge as chat and phone, with anything it should not answer flagged for a person. The address is created the first time you ask for it, not before.

Updated 2026-09-19 · 4 min read · More in channels

Turn it on and take the address

Channels → Email switches it on and shows you the address. You can hand that address out directly — on a contact page, in a signature — or, more usefully, forward the support address your customers already write to.

The address is minted on first use rather than reserved at sign-up. Resuming a half-finished setup does not quietly create a public-facing address behind your back.

Forward your support inbox

Forwarding is one setting in your mail provider, and the channels page spells it out for Gmail, Outlook and Google Workspace. Your customers keep writing to the address they always have; the agent picks it up and replies within minutes rather than within a day.

Forward rather than replace, and keep a copy in your own inbox while you are getting comfortable. Reading what the agent said next to what came in is the fastest way to learn what your knowledge is missing.

  1. Copy the agent's address

    From Channels → Email on the agent.

  2. Add it as a forwarding address

    In Gmail, Outlook or Workspace — the exact path for each is on the channels page.

  3. Verify, if asked

    Most providers send a confirmation to the forwarding address. The agent's inbox receives it and it shows up in Conversations.

  4. Send yourself a test

    Write to your support address from a personal account and read the reply as a customer would.

When an email needs a person

Email handover works like chat: the agent flags the conversation, it appears in the dashboard, and whoever takes it over writes the next reply. The agent stops replying the moment a person joins and picks up again only if the conversation is handed back.

Replies record who wrote them, so a thread that passed between the agent and two people reads as a conversation with your company rather than a jumble of anonymous messages.

FAQ

Related questions

It replies from the address it was written to. Forwarding keeps your published support address as the one customers use; the agent's address is the machinery behind it.

Still stuck? A person will answer.