English (US)
  1. Zendesk help
  2. Zendesk Suite
  3. Using Built by Zendesk apps

Installing and using the Out of Office v2 app

Ben Evans
  • Edited
Zendesk team member

Suite allSuite all

 The Out of Office v2 app is a tool for managing the availability of an agent in Zendesk Support, and ensuring that tickets assigned to unavailable agents are properly handled if updated by a customer.

This article covers the following topics to help you install, use, and extend the app:

How the app works

The Out of Office v2 app displays the availability status of the agent assigned to tickets in Zendesk Support.

For administrators, it also displays a list of agents and their availability.

The app prevents tickets from being accidentally assigned to an agent who is unavailable. When this occurs, a pop-up notification is displayed to the agent.

Installing the app

To install the Out of Office app

  1. In Support, click the Admin icon () in the sidebar, then select Apps > Marketplace.
  2. In the search bar, search for Out of Office, and select the app from the results list.
  3. Click Install in the upper-right corner.
  4. Select or unselect the Confirm status change checkbox. Unselecting this option disables the status change confirmation message. As a result, you cannot choose to unassign an agent's open tickets when marking them as unavailable.
  5. Select or unselect the Force unassign tickets checkbox. Enabling this setting unassigns an agent's open tickets automatically when their status is changed to unavailable. This option is disabled by default, allowing the unassign action to be run on a case-by-case basis.
  6. Select or unselect the Prevent assignment checkbox. Disabling this option allows tickets to be saved if they're assigned to an agent who's unavailable. A warning is still displayed that the assignee is unavailable, and agents can assign tickets to themselves regardless of their status.
  7. Select or unselect the Surface errors encountered when bulk updating tickets? checkbox. Enabling this option causes the unassign process to take longer. Some tickets may still not get updated by Out of Office even with this setting turned on. This setting simply verifies the ticket updates and surfaces any errors encountered whilst updating tickets.
  8. If required, select and configure role restrictions and group restrictions.
  9. Click Install to complete the setup.

Changing the app settings

You can modify the app's default behavior by changing the app settings.

To change the app settings

  1. In Support, click Admin (), then select Apps > Manage.
  2. In the Out of Office app icon, select Change Settings from the dropdown options menu.
  3. Modify your settings and click Update.

Using the app

An agent can modify their status using the app in the ticket sidebar or accessing their user profile.

To modify your availability

  1. In Support, click View, and double click on a ticket to open it. Alternatively, select your user profile icon the upper right, and then click View Profile.
  2. In the ticket app sidebar, under the Out of Office app, select the Availability toggle button. A confirmation dialog box opens to confirm the change.
  3. Click Set as Available to enable availability, or Set as Unavailable to set your status as unavailable.

An administrator can access the Out of Office dashboard to view the availability of agents and modify an agent's status.

To view and modify an agent's availability

  1. In Support, select the Out of Office icon in the left navigation bar. The dashboard opens.
  2. Click on the Availability toggle button next to agent. A confirmation dialog box opens to confirm the change.
  3. Click Set as Available to enable availability, or Set as Unavailable to set an agent's status as unavailable.

Changing the availability status either adds or removes a tag on tickets with a Pending, On-Hold, or Solved  status, and optionally for all tickets with an Open status. For more information, see Understanding the agent_ooo tag below.

When a pending or on-hold ticket is reopened by an end user and the assignee is unavailable, a trigger fires that returns the ticket to the unassigned ticket queue. 

The app checks the status of the assignee each time a ticket is saved. If the assignee is unavailable, the app warns the updater that the assignee is unavailable. If the Prevent assignment? setting is enabled, it also prevents tickets from being saved if the new assignee is unavailable.

The following functions and behaviour can occur when using the Out of Office app in Zendesk Support:

  • An agent can assign a ticket to themselves if they are unavailable. The following warning is displayed after the ticket is saved:
  • An agent can update a ticket if they're not the assignee and the assignee is unavailable. A warning notification is displayed that the current assignee is unavailable:
  • Tickets that are assigned to an unavailable agent with a Pending and On-Hold status, but are updated to Open, are reassigned to the respective ticket's parent group. However, the Assignee field becomes empty. Status changes from Pending or On-Hold occurs when an end-user replies to an email notification.

Understanding the agent_ooo tag

When the Out of Office app v2 is installed, it automatically creates in Zendesk Support the following items:

  • A user field that applies an agent_ooo tag to users marked as unavailable
  • A trigger to handle the unassign action on a ticket based on the agent_ooo tag
  • A trigger to remove the agent_ooo tag from a ticket when it's assigned to a different agent

Note: These items are required for the app to work. Don't delete or modify them.

Changing the availability status either adds or removes an agent_ooo tag on tickets based on the following rules:

  • When an agent marks themselves as unavailable, the agent_ooo tag is added to the agent's user profile in the Agent Out? user field
  • When the agent changes their status to unavailable, the tag is added to all tickets with a Pending, On-Hold, or Solved status. When the agent changes their status to available, the tag is removed from these tickets
  • Any open tickets with the tag are unassigned on update
  • If the ticket assignee is changed, then the tag is removed
  • If the tag is removed from a ticket, no other tags are removed

Limitations

The Out of Office app has the following limitations:

  • If the Prevent assignment? setting is disabled and a ticket is assigned from one unavailable agent to another unavailable agent, the agent_ooo tag will be lost. This means that the ticket will not be unassigned if it is reopened
  • Agents are able to assign a ticket to a group with only one agent even if the sole agent in that group is unavailable
  • The message 'Error: Unable to get list of agents' is displayed for users if their role has the 'Cannot browse or search for users' permission set
  • Agents without administrator rights can't change their status using the app dashboard in the  left navigation bar of the agent interface. They can still change their status in their user profile or from one of their assigned tickets
  • The agent_ooo tag is added to solved tickets. If the ticket is closed while the tag is applied, the tag will not be removable. This may be undesirable for reporting purposes. If so, the system automation that closes solved tickets can be modified to remove the agent_ooo tag
  • When marking an agent as OOO and un-assigning all open tickets, only some of the tickets will actually get unassigned
  • When a ticket assigned to an OOO agent gets updated, the ticket is assigned back to the parent group with a null Assignee value. The trigger working in the background during this action does not currently send an email notification to the agents in the group
  • The app does not prevent assigning tickets unless the ticket is updated individually through the Zendesk interface. Triggers, Mail API, REST API, and bulk editing will be able to bypass the assignment restrictions
  • In some instances, if an agent is downgraded to an end user while unavailable, they will retain the agent_ooo tag until it is removed manually. Any tickets that the end user creates also inherits the agent_ooo tag
  • When updating a large amount of tickets API rate limits can be encountered causing the update process to take longer than usual. Please be patient and allow the app to finish the update process. The update process is finished when the app no longer displays "Updating..." in lieu of the agent's OOO status
  • Updating 5000 assigned tickets can take up to 8 minutes

Troubleshooting

If you were previously using the Out of Office v1 app and have recently upgraded, please review the following steps if you are having issues with agent availability and tickets being assigned:

  1. Click the Admin icon () in the sidebar, then select Settings > Customers.
  2. Make sure that the Tags on users and organizations setting is enabled.
  3. Click Save tab to save your settings.
  4. Click the Admin icon () in the sidebar, then select Apps > Manage. 
  5. Select the Out of Office app. In the settings, toggle the Force unassign tickets setting on and then off, and finally set it according to your requirements.
  6. Click Update to save your changes.

Release notes

Version 2.8.5 — 2020-12-03

  • Fixed an issue where it was possible to assign tickets to OOO agents.

 Version 2.8.4 — 2020-09-01

  • Allows only one installation of the App on an account
  • Fixed an issue with the confirm change setting(dialog) not working
  • Fixed some translations

Version 2.8.3 - 2020-02-18

  • Breaking changes:  Removed support for IE11. For more information, see  Removal of support for Internet Explorer 11 

  • Bug fixes:
    • Fixed an issue where open tickets not un-assigning when the status is toggled from the ticket sidebar
    • Fixed issues where a ticket prevented assignment
    • Fixed an issue that now allows an update of tickets assigned to OOO agents
    • Fixed an issue that prevented updates if changing ticket assignee to an agent that's OOO
    • Fixed an issue that prevented assigning new or existing tickets to agents that are OOO
    • Fixed an issue with a frozen availability toggle button upon error in changing an agent's status
  • Improvements:
    • Tickets are updated based on recent updated tickets assigned to the agent
    • Light agents aren't displayed in the navigation bar since they can't be assigned tickets
    • When "Surface errors encountered when bulk updating tickets?" is selected, it can take up to one minute to validate ticket updates. If validation takes longer than one minute, a warning is shown asking the agent to try again.
    • Improved error handling and notifications. Notifications upon error will last for 10 seconds
    • Minor CSS and user interface updates
  • Known issues: There will occasionally be an issue where an agent's ticket may not get tagged properly.  In such cases, the app will show an error. To resolve the error, toggle the agent's status back to the previous state, and then toggle the agent's status to the desired state.

Version 2.8.1 — 2019-11-11

  • Fixed an issue with the navbar location not sorting agents in alphabetical order by default
  • Fixed an issue where searching for agents is case sensitive
  • Fixed an issue where the Out of Office toggle button was showing up in the sidebar for end user profiles
  • Fixed an issue where the new ticket screen allowed an agent to assign a ticket to someone who was set to Out of Office
  • Fixed an issue with the "Surface errors encountered when bulk updating tickets?" feature and app setting, where tickets were not properly checked for successful updates or not.

 

 

Return to top
Have more questions? Submit a request

180 Comments

  • Ben Evans
    Zendesk team member

    Hi Everyone,

    A new version of the app has just been released that solves a number of issues from the previous version. I've also reworked the interface design to help save space in the app sidebar. This version makes updating tickets with the agent_ooo tag significantly faster and more reliable.

    You can review the full set of release notes here:

    https://github.com/zendesklabs/out_of_office_app/releases/tag/v2.6.2

    0
  • Helen Ng
    • Edited

    Hi Benjamin

    First, thanks for the update. The icon looks much nicer haha..

    But after this update, it shows a JavaScript error when I tried to change to unavailable. It only happens when I use IE 10...

    "Unable to get property 'assignee' of undefined or null reference".

    Any idea what this is about?

    I also would like to report a bug of this app. It also happens in IE 10 only.

    When I access it through the sidebar. It shows a list of agents who is available or not available. When I typed something in the search, the typing went backwards.

    Thanks in advance!

    0
  • Ben Evans
    Zendesk team member

    Hi Helen,

    Thank you for the bug report. I will take a look at it and see if a solution can be found. As a warning, I will be dropping support for IE 10 when it reaches end-of-support on consumer operating systems starting January 12, 2016. While I won't intentionally break compatibility I'd highly advise updating as soon as possible.

    0
  • Antje Gallo

    Hi Benjamin,
    we just set some agents to unavailable and found that the tag wasn't added & the open tickets didn't get unassigned from the agents when ticking the "unassign all open tickets" checkbox.
    This has worked before. Could you please look into this?
    Thanks,
    Antje

    0
  • Ben Evans
    Zendesk team member

    Hi Antje,

    Thank you for the report. I'm investigating the issue.

    0
  • Thanos Massias
    • Edited

    Somehow I have a problem with [ui.js] line:

    var userRequestedUnassign = (input.length === 1) ? input[0].checked : false,

    always returning false. To get around the issue I replaced it with:

    var userRequestedUnassign = this.$("input.checkbox_reassign_current").is(":checked")

    and, in [app.js], I added    

    class="checkbox_reassign_current"

    to

    var checkbox = ...
    0
  • Aja Varney

    Hey Benjamin!

    We'd love to be able to use this feature... but for some reason, the agent_ooo tag isn't being applied to tickets. It's showing in the agent profile, but when an incoming ticket is assigned to them, the tag (and resulting actions) don't get applied to the ticket... 

    I know main ZD support doesn't troubleshoot this, but is there a way for us to talk through this with you, perhaps? Thanks!

    0
  • Claire Smith

    It would be great if this feature could update voice and live chat as well.

    We often have agents who leave the office and forget to sign out of their phone/ live chat and to have the ability to turn everything (including assigning out their tickets) would be great! 

     

    Thanks

    0
  • David Stevenson

    We've started using this app, but I can't get the unassignment of open tickets to work.  The tagging of pending / on-hold / solved tickets is working, as is the trigger that tests for the existence of the tag, but the option to unassign all open tickets is not working.  I am using the agent confirm dialog, where each agent can choose to unassign open tickets, and have tested with the force unassign global setting ticked and unticked.  In all cases open tickets are left assigned to the agent immediately after they make themselves unavailable.

    Am I doing something wrong?  Is there a delay on the unassign action (automation)?

    0
  • Jessie Schutz
    Zendesk team member

    Hi David!

    Based on what you're describing here (the tickets are unassigned and then re-assigned immediately), it sounds like there's another trigger that's basically un-doing the work of your OOO trigger.

    If you click on the "See All Events" button at the top of the conversation thread in a ticket, it'll show you what triggers fired on the ticket, and what actions those triggers took. You can use that to identify the rogue trigger, and then update the conditions so that it doesn't fire when the OOO tags are present. 

    Let me know if you need more help!

    0
  • Chris Wilson

    Hi,

    This app is awesome and I think should be a core part of Zendesk, not just Zendesk Labs.  It's crucial functionality.

    However, we're running into an issue that's making it hard to use for us.  For whatever reason, when someone updates their Out of Office status in the ticket app, it doesn't always update their status.  If we click on the Suitcase icon and check there, it'll still show as their old status.

    Is anyone else running into this?  We're hoping we can find a fix, because as of right now it's breaking the app for us. :(

    Thanks,
    Chilly

    0
  • Ben Evans
    Zendesk team member

    Hi All,

    A new update to the app was just pushed with contains two minor updates, thanks to community contributions.

    1. A visual fix to the footer of the app in the sidebar.
    2. A bugfix for the "unassign all open tickets?" option.

    @Chris I've created a ticket so that we can discuss the details of the issue.

     

     

    0
  • Kathryn Castle

    Hey all,

    Can you anyone provide detail on what permissions admins have to override their own admin status? I've noticed that I'm able to assign/close tickets under my name even though I'm "out of office" and had a report from another admin that tickets they previously assigned to themselves were not bounced back to the parent queue when the end user responded, despite their also being marked out of office at the time. 

    If this is a deliberate feature, it'd be great to understand how it works so I can advise the admins on our team. I couldn't find any such information in the help articles.

    Thanks!

    0
  • David Stevenson

    Hi Jessie,

    Sorry it has taken me a month to respond, I had forgotten about this and have been instructing my agents to ensure there are no tickets with a status of open assigned to them when they go unavailable.  I've followed your advice and checked the all actions on open and pending tickets, and there is a difference.  On open tickets the out of office app unassign trigger removes the agent_ooo tag - looking at this trigger that appears to be its designed function.  I've attached screenshots which I hope will help you understand what I'm seeing.




    0
  • Dennis Lynn
    Zendesk Customer Advocate

    Hi Kathryn,

    As an admin, you have complete control over your own OOO status. Additionally, you are always allowed to update tickets to which you are currently assigned, even if you are OOO. The idea is that as the OOO agent, you are aware of your own status when making these changes and/or assigning tickets to yourself. 

    Now, regarding your agent's tickets not being reassigned - it's possible that somehow this agent_ooo tag is being removed from the ticket, which would then prevent it from following the business rules for the agent OOO app. Alternatively, tickets that are reopened when an agent is OOO are reassigned to the parent group - however, the assignee field becomes empty. Additionally, no notification is sent out to the group of this change. To send out this notification, you would create a trigger for this purpose. Details on how this is done can be found here: Extending the app

    I'll reach out to you via ticket as well, to ensure that there aren't any account-specific settings that may be preventing the app from functioning. I'll see you in that ticket!

     

    1
  • Ben Evans
    Zendesk team member

    @David -

    The most recent version of the app (released last week) has a fix for the unassign open tickets checkbox, which might solve the issue you are having. Could you try again and let us know if it is still a problem?

    0
  • Sarah Knoell

    Hello - We installed this app this week, and have noticed that the app is not letting us flag anyone as out-of-office.  Is something going on with the app?

    Thanks!

    0
  • Jessie Schutz
    Zendesk team member

    Hey Sarah!

    I checked with Ben, who owns this app, and he's not aware of any issues. I've also been able to set agents to unavailable in my test account without any problems. Can you describe exactly what's happening when you try to flag somebody? Are you getting any kind of error message?

    0
  • Sarah Knoell

    @Jessie - Hi Jessie!

    When I click on the button/slider to mark an agent or myself as unavailable the button/slider starts to fill in red, but then when it is done loading it goes back to available.    Let me know if you would like me to take a screenshot.

    Thanks!

    0
  • Jessie Schutz
    Zendesk team member

    Hey Sarah!

    There are a couple of things I'd like you to try here: Firstly, try clearing your browser cache and cookies. If that doesn't do it, try uninstalling and re-installing the app in your Zendesk.

    If neither of those things fix the issue, we'll probably want you to submit a support ticket so we can do more in-depth troubleshooting.

    Let me know how it goes!

    0
  • Sarah Knoell

    @Jessie - Hello!  I cleared the cookies in Chrome, but the app would still not allow me to flag an agent or myself as unavailable.

    I then went ahead and uninstalled and then reinstalled the app in Zendesk, but again the app will not let me flag anyone or myself as unavailable.

    Should I start a ticket and include you somehow?

    Thanks!

    0
  • Erica Rey

    @Sarah - Have you checked that the correct roles are selected in the app settings? Go to Manage in the Apps menu to edit the settings for the app. You'll be able to view which roles have the app available to them. Hopefully that does the trick!

    0
  • Sarah Knoell

    @Erica - Thank you so much for the suggestion, but unfortunately (or fortunately) all user roles are set up correctly and I did not include any user restrictions within the app.

    0
  • Ben Evans
    Zendesk team member

    @Sarah

    It looks like the "Agent Out?" user field in your account is disabled. The app can't function without that field to track the agent status, so could you try again after enabling the field?

     

    0
  • Sarah Knoell

    @Benjamin - That was the issue!  The app now functions!  Thank you so much!!!

    0
  • Katie Pursinger

    Hi, 

    Is there any way to customize a trigger or API to notify an agent when they are marked as unavailable? We mark them as unavailable if they are out sick, etc. and would like them to have an email stating they are marked out so they have a trigger to remember to mark themselves as available again when they are back in the office.

    Alternatively, if this isn't possible, will scheduling be something that is coming down the pipeline soon?

    Thanks so much! 

     

    0
  • Ferran Barneda Delporte

    Hi Katie,

    You could create a Script that would check if the field "agent_ooo" is false or true, if it is true then send an email to the agent' email mentioning that.

    This can be done with our API:
    https://developer.zendesk.com/rest_api/docs/core/users

    Hope this helps!

    0
  • Brett Youngberg

    Hi - I'm just trying this out and testing. We set one of our agents unavailable, created a test ticket assigned to herself. She then responded to the user and marked it pending. The user then replied to that email but the ticket was not reassigned to the group. Are we missing something?

    I get the warning message if I try and assign a ticket to her while she is marked Unavailable which is great, but we don't want customers responding to solved, pending, on-hold, or closed tickets and having it assign to an agent that is unavailable. The agent is also an admin (if that matters)

    This is from the app marketplace description of the app:

    7. Existing Tickets updated by the Requester while Assignee is unavailable resets the Assignee field back to it's parent group and (notifies Requester)

    It also didn't notify the requester and I don't see that in the two triggers I see created. Please help.

     

    0
  • Madison Davis
    Zendesk Community Team

    Hi Brett! Sorry for the delay on an answer here. Could you confirm that you checked the "Force unassign tickets?"  box in the app configuration before replying to the test ticket?

    The description from the Marketplace listing is unfortunately not accurate for the out-of-the-box installation of the app, but you could definitely customize the system triggers created by the app to notify the requester of the reassignment! 

    0
  • Mike Bedney
    • Edited

    TL;DR Summary:

    We are using the Help Center in Zendesk version: 1.202.6 (9dc8a52) and this app version is v2.6.3.
    We are having a problem when an agent switches back to being available.  Their tickets still carry the OOO tags that leave our tickets into an unassigned ticket view. 

     

    The issue is reproducible by following these steps:

    • Ticket is created
    • Agent in the office claims ticket using "Take It" button and clicks Open
    • The agent can respond or not respond (results are the same)
    • Agent marks themselves Unavailable (see Additional Detals section below)
    • Tickets now tagged with agent_ooo and agent_ooo_ticket_open and rightfully shows up in a shared view with tickets that are unassigned
    • Agent marks themselves Available in the same manner in step 4
    • Both OOO ticket tags persist which leaves the ticket in ourunassigned ticket view.  The ticket still belongs to the agent though.

    I've our Zendesk Administrator we have not done any custom work to this app.

     

    Additional details:

    • OOO tags on my tickets are only set when sliding this green bar/toggle

     

    • OOO tags are not assigned when checking this box (but the toggle in the screenshot above does change to unavailable

     

     

    • This shows the tags still persist when even when using toggle (also tried check box).  I end up manually removing them or on some tickets I need to unassign it, hit submit (submit = open, pending, whatever status), then reopen it, assign it to myself, and hit submit again.

     

    Thanks for any help you can offer.  I love this app and appreciate your hard work.

    -Mike

    0

Please sign in to leave a comment.

Related articles

Powered by Zendesk