Why do I see the Answer Bot in the Chat SDK even though I don't have a subscription?

Question

I see that I have Answer Bot when I start a chat using the Chat SDK, but I don't have a subscription for Answer Bot. How is that possible?

Answer

In the Chat SDK V2, the Answer Bot feature visible in the Chat is a simple chat bot to make the interaction more human. It is there to replace the pre-chat form. You won't be billed for using this feature. 

This feature is different from the Answer Bot that suggests articles, even though they share a name by default. You can change the name of this bot. For more information on this, see the Android documentation and the IOS documentation.

If you want to use the Answer Bot feature from Zendesk Guide, check the documentation about the Unified SDK, which can use the Answer Bot engine to suggest articles: Unified SDK Android and Unified SDK iOS.

If you do not want to ask questions to your users, disable the pre-chat form (Chat SDK v2 for Android and Chat SDK v2 for iOS) and set the .withPreChatFormEnabled option to false in the builder of the Messaging Activity (this starts the Chat).

 When your account is offline and the .withAgentAvailabilityEnabled is set to true there are a few things to consider:

• If it is set to true, the SDK checks if your account is available, and if it has at least one agent online. If those conditions are not fulfilled, the bot will then advise you that the account is offline.
• If .withOfflineFormsEnabled is true (default) you will be able to leave an offline message. If it isn't the bot will inform you that the account is offline and will tell you to try later on.