A queue represents a business unit in your organization with specific responsibilities. Queues help you assign incoming visitors to the most suitable agents. You can create multiple queues to group your agents according to their responsibilities.
Add New Queue
（1）Log in to your Cloudfon CX control panel.
（2）From the left navigation menu, go to Global Settings > People > Chat Queue.
（3）Click Add.
（4）On the New queue page, enter the queue name and add agents to the queue. You can add descriptions to help you identify the queue.
（5）Click Save.
Now you have successfully created a queue.
Set Queue Auto Distribution
WebChat Auto Distribution
Available in Omnichannel Widget: When selected, the queue appears as an option in Web Chat configurations such auto distribution rules.
CloudFon CX web chat supports auto distribution which allows you to distribute chats to the agent you want automatically. The advanced rule-based auto distribution allows you to distribute chats to the most suitable agent using a combination of basic distribution rules, preference rules, and backup rules.
WebChat Distribution Rules define how chat requests are distributed to agents within a queue. Basic distribution rules include Load Balancing, Round Robin, Capability Weighted, Preference and Backup rule.
Note: Auto Distribution distribute chats to online agents who have not reached their maximum number of concurrent chats. Chats are not distributed to agents in Away or Offline statuses.
Load Balancing
Load Balancing distributes chats to the agent who has the least number of concurrent chats. This balances the workload among each agent and prevents that one agent from being overwhelmed by too many chats.
If agents are taking the same number of concurrent chats, the new incoming chat goes to the agent whose last allocation time was earliest.
For example, the maximum concurrent chat number of Agent A and B is three, and both of them are taking two chats, last time Agent A gets allocated a chat at 10:00, and Agent B gets allocated at 10:02, then the incoming chat goes to Agent A.If none of the agents are taking chats, then the chat goes to the agent who has longest idle time. For agents who have been allocated a chat, the idle time starts from when they ended last chat; for agents who have not been allocated a chat, the idle time starts from when they get online.
For example, among Agent A, B, C, Agent A and B get online at 9:50, 9:51, Agent C gets online at 10:00.When none of Agent A, B, C has been distributed a chat, the new chat goes to Agent A (who gets online earliest).
When Agent A, B have been distributed a chat and ended the chat at 10:01, 10:02 respectively, and Agent C got online at 10:03, the new chat goes to Agent A (who has the longest idle time).
Note: Getting offline and online again resets the idle time and last allocation time. If agents change their status to Offline or Away and then get online again, chats are auto-distributed according to the latest time when they get online.
Round Robin
Round Robin distributes chats to agents in the sequence of time when they get online. This ensures equal chatting opportunities for all your agents, which is especially useful to sales teams who need equal opportunities to close deals.
Agents who have reached their maximum concurrent chat number are skipped.
The distribution order remains the same if an agent gets Away or offline.
If a new agent joins after auto-distribution starts, the sequence of the agent is after current round of distribution completes. For example, Agent A, B, C gets online in time order, Agent A gets distributed a chat, and Agent D joins, then Agent D will be allocated after current round completes (ended by Agent A), and the sequence becomes B > C > A > D.
Capability Weighted
Capability Weighted distributes chats to agents with the lowest capacity utilization ratio. Agent’s capacity utilization ratio = Ongoing chat number / maximum concurrent chat number. Capability Weighted allows you to distribute more chats to agents with higher chat capability.
If two agents have same capacity utilization ratio:
If they are both taking chats, the chat goes to the agent whose last allocation time was earlier.
If neither of them are taking chats, then the chat goes to the agent who has longest idle time. For agents who have been assigned a chat, the idle time starts from when they ended last chat; for agents who have not been assigned a chat, the idle time starts from when they get online.
Preference Rule
You can enable Last Chatted Agent Preferred for each queue. When enabled, the chat goes to the agent who has chatted with the visitor if the agent is online and has not reached the maximum chat number. The preference rule helps you provide a more personalized service and increases chat efficiency.
Note:
The preference rule does not change the basic distribution rule.
CloudFon CX identifies the visitor based on the browser cookies. If the visitor changes the browser or clears the cookie, the system deems the visitor as a new one.
Backup Rule
You can choose a backup queue for routing to each queue. Chats can be distributed to agents in the backup queue when all the agents in the original queue are offline or have reached their maximum chat number. The backup rule allows you to deliver nonstop customer service in special occasions, for example, when the sales queue is overwhelmed by visitors in peak seasons, you can set your support team as the backup to balance the workload.
Note:
When all the agents in the original queue are offline, and agents in the backup queue are online, the chat button appears online to visitors.
In Web Chat reports, chats taken by agents in the backup queue are counted to the original queue.
Inbox Auto Distribution
Available in Inbox: When selected, the queue appears as an option in Inbox configurations such as auto distribution rules.
Auto Distribution in Inbox enables you to auto distribute tickets to agents to make sure the workload is distributed optimally. Once tickets are auto-distributed, agents do not need to pick up tickets manually. You can define distribution rules of how tickets are assigned to agents and the maximum tickets an agent can accept automatically.
How does Auto Distribution work?
Auto distribution happens only on newly created tickets. If the same ticket needs to be allocated to another agent, then you can do it manually.
Tickets are auto distributed to agents who have logged in to the CloudFon CX Agent Console. By default, the system distributes tickets to online agents only. You can change the settings to distribute tickets to agents in Away or any custom away statuses.
Once tickets are distributed before the distribution rule is set up, they cannot be auto-distributed again irrespective of the ticket's status. Only agents who have the permission can manually assign those tickets to the agent or re-assign them to another agent.
Each ticket can only be auto-distributed once. If you manually change an auto-distributed ticket's assignee to Unassigned, it cannot be auto-distributed again.
Note: Tickets enter a queue waiting to be distributed when all of your team members are offline. If you manually assign a ticket to an agent and change the assignee back to Unassigned during this period, the ticket can be auto distributed after agents get online. This is because the ticket has not been auto distributed and does not have an assignee.
What happens if all agents go offline?
If all agents go Offline at a given time, New tickets will be auto distributed after agents log in. There is no time lag for the allocated tickets to push out to agents. As long as new tickets and agents do not reach their maximum ticket count, the ticket will be auto-pushed out to the logged-in agent. When all agents reach their capacity, then New tickets will be in a ticket queue waiting to be allocated.
Note: You can also manually allocate tickets regardless of the agent's status.
Auto Distribution Rules
CloudFon CX Inbox follow three types of auto distribution rules—Load Balancing, Round Robin and Keep Chat Queue As Assignee. Load balancing distributes tickets to the least loaded agent with lowest capacity utilization rate, while Round Robin allocates tickets to agents one after the other based on the order they get online. And Keep Chat Queue As Assignee distributes tickets to the chat queue and won't be allocated to agents.
(1) In the Auto Distribution Method section, you can turn on the toggle key if you prefer assigning the tickets to their last assignee.
(2) In the Maximum Number of Auto-Assigned Tickets section, you can do one of the following:
Set the maximum number of auto-assigned tickets for all agents.
Set the maximum number of auto-assigned tickets for each agent. You can filter the agents by queue.
Turn off the toggle key if you do not want to auto-assign tickets to an individual agent.
(3) (Optional) Select Pending External or On Hold or both statuses in the Excluded Status section.
Tickets marked with both statuses are not counted when the CloudFon CX Inbox verify if an agent has reached their predefined maximum number of tickets.
(4) (Optional) To auto distribute tickets to agents in Away or any other custom away statuses, turn off the Automatically distribute tickets to only tickets only toggle key.
(5) Click Save.
Congratulations, you have successfully set up Auto Distribution. Your tickets will be automatically assigned to the agents.
Office Hours of Queue
You can choose to default to the office hour set in the global setting, or you can reset a new one for the current queue.
By default, office hour default by global settings.
（1）Select the Default by specific settings
Office hours with specific settings has higher priority than global setting.
（2）Select your Time Zone.
（3）On the Working Hours tab, add your working hours for the days on which your customer service team is working.
（4）On the Holidays tab, click the Add Holiday button to set your holidays. You can also remove an existing holiday from the Operations column.
（5）Click Save.