Email in the console

E-mail appears in two places in the contact-center console: an administrator adds mailboxes under Admin → Mailboxes, and agents read and answer threads under Email.

Admin → Mailboxes

Lists every mailbox the platform collects from. A mailbox added here is checked on its own interval; removing one stops collection and deletes its stored sign-in details, but keeps the threads already received.

Field	What it does
Method	Password, or OAuth. Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace accept only OAuth for mail; an on-premises Exchange server and most other servers accept a password.
Address	The mailbox to sign in as, and the default address replies are sent from.
Password	Stored encrypted and never shown again. A saved one reads back as a placeholder.
Provider / Application ID / Directory ID	OAuth only. From the app registration you created with Microsoft or Google. The Directory ID is Microsoft’s tenant identifier.
Access token	OAuth only. Must allow both reading the mailbox and sending as it.

Leaving a credential field empty when you edit a mailbox keeps the stored value. That is deliberate: re-saving the form to change an unrelated setting cannot blank a working password by accident. To change a credential, type the new one.

Incoming mail

Field	What it does
Server / Port	Where mail is collected from.
Security	Encrypted (993), upgrade-to-encrypted (143), or none.
Folder	Which folder to read. `INBOX` unless your provider files incoming mail elsewhere.
Check every	How often the mailbox is checked.

Shorter intervals mean customers wait less for a reply to start. Providers limit how often you may connect, so a very short interval on a hosted mailbox can get the connection refused — if a mailbox starts failing after you shorten it, that is usually why.

Pointing at the wrong folder is the most common reason a correctly configured mailbox collects nothing at all. It is spelled INBOX on most servers, and the name is case-sensitive on some.

Outgoing mail

Field	What it does
Server / Port	Where replies are submitted. Usually not the same server as incoming.
Security	Upgrade-to-encrypted (587), encrypted (465), or none.
Password for sending	Leave empty to sign in for sending with the same password as above.
Reply address / Reply name	What the customer sees a reply come from. Set them when replies should appear to come from a team rather than the raw mailbox address.

Routing

Field	What it does
Routing program	The flow that handles a new thread. Without one, mail is collected and stored but never offered to an agent.
Skill	Which group of agents handles this mailbox — exactly as for a call.
Collect mail from this mailbox	Pauses collection without deleting the mailbox or its credentials. Use it during a migration.

Check now

Checks the mailbox immediately instead of waiting for the interval. It is the quickest way to confirm a new mailbox works. For a few seconds after you add a mailbox it reports that the mailbox is not loaded yet — that is normal. If it still says so after a minute, the mailbox was saved but is not being picked up; confirm it is switched on.

Email (agent screen)

The agent’s workspace for threads routed to their skills.

The rail lists threads, most recent activity first, unread in bold. The Unread and Closed filters narrow it; a Mailbox selector appears when your organisation monitors more than one.
The thread reads oldest message first. Inbound messages sit left, replies right.
Reply sends from the mailbox the thread arrived in. Send & close sends and closes in one step, the normal ending for a question fully answered.
Close thread ends a thread without replying — for an automated notice or a duplicate. Reopen puts it back.
Mark read / Mark unread changes the message’s state in the mailbox, not only in the console.
Filtered switches the list to mail that was set aside — auto-replies, delivery failures, mailing lists, and messages the sender’s provider flagged. Nothing is deleted, so anything held wrongly is still readable here.

A message labelled converted from a formatted message had its readable text recovered from a formatted original. Layout, images and tables are not shown; if the meaning depends on them, open the mail in a normal client before answering.

When something looks wrong

Symptom	Usual cause
Mailbox collects nothing	Wrong folder, or the mailbox is switched off.
Mail arrives but no agent is offered it	No routing program set on the mailbox.
Sign-in fails though the password is right	The mailbox is on Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace, which no longer accept a password for mail. Switch to OAuth.
Receiving works, every reply fails	Outgoing server or port wrong, or an OAuth token that only allows reading.
Threads look read that nobody read here	Someone read them in Outlook or Gmail. The mailbox is the source of truth, so the console follows it.
A real customer’s mail is not in the inbox	Check Filtered. Mail is set aside only on its headers, so this is rare — but it is kept, not deleted, and a reply from a person into that thread routes normally.
An out-of-office shows in a thread but got no answer	Deliberate. Answering an automatic message makes the far side answer again, which loops until your provider throttles the mailbox.

How the channel works

Threading, routing and read/unread, end to end.

Skills and routing

The queues and flows e-mail shares with calls.

Build a Contact Center

Email in the console

Admin → Mailboxes

Incoming mail

Outgoing mail

Routing

Check now

Email (agent screen)

When something looks wrong

Next

How the channel works

Skills and routing

​Admin → Mailboxes

​Sign-in

​Incoming mail

​Outgoing mail

​Routing

​Check now

​Email (agent screen)

​When something looks wrong

​Next

How the channel works

Skills and routing

Admin → Mailboxes

Sign-in

Incoming mail

Outgoing mail

Routing

Check now

Email (agent screen)

When something looks wrong

Next