When your widget is offline, visitors can leave a message with their contact information in the offline form.
This article discusses the following topics:
Editing the offline form message
By default, this form is enabled with the message shown "Sorry, we aren't online at the moment. Leave a message and we'll get back to you." For Team, Professional, and Enterprise plans, you can edit the message that appears or disable the form completely.
The rules for using your offline form differ based on which version of Zendesk Chat you’re using. For help figuring out which version you have, see Determining your Zendesk Chat account version.
Zendesk Chat Phase 4 and Chat Phase 3 with integrated Chat experience
The following instructions apply to you if you are using Chat Phase 4 (with or without integrated Support), or Chat Phase 3 with the integrated Chat experience.
To edit the offline form message
- In your Chat dashboard, go to Settings > Widget and click the Forms tab.
- In the Offline Form section, edit the text in the Offline Greeting field, then click Save Changes.
To disable the offline form
- In your Chat dashboard, go to Settings > Widget and click the Forms tab.
- In the Offline Form section, click Off, then click Save Changes.
Note: The offline form is disabled automatically if you are using the contact form in the Web Widget.
Zendesk Chat Phase 3
If you’re using Chat Phase 3 with the original Chat functionality, you need to use the contact form component of the Web Widget. For details, see Using Web Widget to embed customer service in your website.
If you are using Chat Phase 3 with the new integrated Chat experience, see Zendesk Chat Phase 4 and Chat Phase 3 with integrated Chat experience, above.
Enabling messaging channels
If you want to link out to your social messaging channels when the widget is offline, you can toggle on the following channels:
- Facebook Messenger
- Twitter Direct Messages
Facebook Messenger
To add your Facebook account, you will need to specify your Facebook username or page ID. We recommend using the page ID because it is constant whereas you can change your username.
To get your page ID
- Open your Facebook page and click on the About tab.
- Scroll to the bottom of the More Info section and you will see the specific Page ID. Copy and paste that number into the offline form settings page.
Twitter Direct Messages
To add your Twitter account, you will need to specify your Twitter User ID.
To get your Twitter User ID
- Log in to your Twitter account.
- Go to Your Twitter Data page.
- Under the Username field, copy and paste the User ID number into the offline form settings page.
When turning on Twitter Direct Messages on the widget, you will want to ensure that you have turned on "Receive Direct Messages from anyone"in your Twitter account.
15 Comments
Is there a way to integrate the offline form into a native mobile application (iOS/Android)?
Hi Alejandro,
Offline form is supported in our mobile SDKs, the docs can be found here:
https://developer.zendesk.com/embeddables/docs/ios-chat-sdk/introduction
https://developer.zendesk.com/embeddables/docs/android-chat-sdk/introduction
Thanks,
Ramin
We have our internal users logged in through SSO, so they don't have to "introduce themselves". More precisely. we don't want them to be able to change the personal details as this creates major issues on the backend. How can I still use the offline form, but not have the requester be able to change the contact details?
@Mirjam I have answered your question in your other post: https://chat.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/217777858/comments/360001287648
@Ramin Thank you I just thought to ask here too just in case. thank you.
Hello,
I am trying to understand what triggers offline form - no agents online or the office hours? Is there a way to set up the offline form to always appear outside the office hours, even if some agents are online? We use the mobile app and sometimes we forget to switch it off for weekends etc., but we don't want to confuse our users and give them an impression we are ready to attend them.
Thanks
Marta
Hi Marta,
If you are using operating hours, it enforces the agent status (except the logins from the mobile apps). To ensure the widget is set to offline on the weekends while using the mobile apps/operating hours, you will want to use the setStatus API to force the widget to offline on the weekends.
You can learn more about the setStatus API here: https://api.zopim.com/files/meshim/widget/controllers/LiveChatAPI-js.html#setStatus
Thanks,
Ramin
Is there a way to adjust the system notification email when the offline form is filled out so that all the agents are Bcc'd the email, not just added as To ??
Or is there way to admin who gets the offline notification at all, with all the agents getting the same email, the chance for duplicate responses is high
I tested it and the email notification gets sent to every agent and all their emails and names are visible? we have compliance rules that this conflicts with, so for now I have to disable the feature entirely?
From: Zendesk Chat <noreply@zopim.com>
Date: 9/15/19 9:43 PM (GMT-05:00)
To: msimpson@rpost.com, wgrote@rpost.com, jchatelain@rpost.com, jmenzin@rpost.com, nvillacarlos@rpost.com
Subject: Offline Message : testing - please respond to whoever sees this.
Hi William,
Currently, there is no setting to change the to/bcc logic and we have no immediate plans to change this. The offline message notifications is mostly beneficial for smaller teams/businesses and we recommend larger businesses to use Chat to Support ticket creation instead.
Creating tickets will help solve the agent conflict problem you described because you can see who is reading/updating tickets inside the Support interface.
If you have compliance requirements to follow, your best bet is to get your agents to disable the offline message notification setting or consider moving to the Support product and use ticket creation instead.
-Ramin
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