Choose where AI agent handoffs go
Decide who gets a conversation when your AI agent hands it to a person. Use the Unassigned queue or one specific teammate, and pick manual or round-robin assignment.
Updated 3 min read
On this page
Your AI agent always answers first. When it can't help, it hands the conversation to your team. Assignment & routing decides where that conversation goes.
Time: about 3 minutes
Before you start
- You need the Owner, Admin or Supervisor role to change these settings. Viewers can see them but can't change them.
- If you want to send handoffs to one person, that person needs a role that can take conversations: Owner, Admin, Supervisor or Agent. Viewers can't be assigned conversations. See Team and roles.
How a handoff works
Every conversation follows the same path: Customer, then AI agent ("Always first"), then Resolved or escalated, then Human team. Your team can also take over any conversation at any time from the conversation view, with no setup. See Reply to customers and take over from the AI agent.
Under When your AI agent hands off, the page lists what makes a conversation leave the agent and look for a person. Both are always on and you can't change them:
- Customer asks for a human, for example "Speak to someone" or "transfer me".
- Knowledge gap, when the AI agent can't safely answer.
Choose where handoffs go
- In the console, go to Settings → Assignment & routing.
- Under Handover details → Where escalated conversations go, choose one:
- Unassigned queue (the default): "Assigned by the method below".
- Specific agent: "Always route to one person". Then pick a person under Teammate.
- If you chose Unassigned queue, choose a method under After handover — assign to:
- Manual: "Agents claim from the Unassigned queue".
- Round-robin: "Each conversation goes to the next agent in turn".
- Choose whether to Respect business hours (see below).
- Click Save changes. You'll see Saved.
The Balanced option ("Assigns to the agent with fewest open conversations") is shown but marked "not available yet". You can't select it.
Respect business hours
When this is on, handoffs that arrive outside your business hours stay unassigned instead of being routed to someone ("Outside business hours, handoffs stay unassigned instead of being routed to someone."). It only applies once handoffs are assigned automatically, so it's greyed out while the method is Manual.
If you switch it on but business hours are switched off, you'll see "Business hours are switched off, so handoffs are assigned at any time." Set them up in Business hours.
Confirm it works
Hand a test conversation to your team and check where it lands:
- Manual: it appears in Conversations → Unassigned.
- Round-robin: it's assigned to the next agent in turn and shows in that person's My open view.
- Specific agent: it's assigned to the person you chose.
- With Respect business hours on, a handoff outside your business hours stays in Unassigned.
See Use the Conversations inbox for the views.
Troubleshooting
"Choose the teammate handoffs should go to." You picked Specific agent but didn't choose a person. Pick a teammate under Teammate, then save.
"That teammate can no longer take assigned conversations." The person was removed or changed to a Viewer since you opened the page. Choose someone else.
"No one can take assigned conversations yet" Nobody in the workspace has a role that can take conversations. Invite a teammate as an Agent or higher from Settings → Team & access. See Invite your team.
"Couldn't save routing settings. Please try again." Try again. If it keeps failing, reload the page.
"Couldn't load routing settings." Click Try again.
The Save changes button is greyed out Either nothing has changed yet, or your role can't change this setting.