Channels
Email: drafts for human review
How the agent prepares email replies for a person on your team to approve before they are sent, and how your team decides, category by category, when replies go out directly.
On this page
Some inboxes carry too much risk for any reply to go out unseen: complaints, disputes, anything a regulator might later read. For those, the agent prepares the reply and holds it for a person on your team to approve. Your team reviews, edits if needed, and sends, with the customer's history, the facts used and their sources in front of them.
It is a common first step for sensitive inboxes, and a way for your team to see exactly how the agent handles your customers before deciding what it may send directly. Drafts for review are configured during implementation for the mailboxes and categories you choose.
How a draft reaches your customer
- An email arrives in a mailbox the agent monitors.
- The agent prepares the reply. It reads the email and the whole thread, identifies the customer, looks up what it needs in your systems, and writes a reply within your limits, with any documents attached.
- The draft is held. Nothing is sent. The draft waits in the review queue in the Conversations view of the Telonic console (the web application your team uses).
- A person on your team reviews it. They can approve it as written, edit it and then approve it, or reject it and reply themselves or pass it to a colleague.
- The approved reply is sent from your mailbox, in the same thread, and recorded against the customer.
What the reviewer sees
| Item | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| The customer's email and the full thread | The reviewer judges the draft against what the customer actually wrote |
| The draft, with any attachments | Exactly what the customer will receive |
| The facts used and their sources | Amounts, dates and terms are inserted directly from your systems, and the reviewer can see where each came from |
| The customer record | Previous calls, messages and emails, and anything still open |
| The category of the email | Why this draft is in the review queue |
Choosing what is reviewed
Review is set by category, not all or nothing. Categories follow the reason the customer got in touch, the mailbox, or the kind of customer, so routine requests can go out directly while sensitive ones wait for a person.
| Industry | Typically sent directly | Typically held for review |
|---|---|---|
| Property | Payment schedule requests, handover appointment confirmations | Service charge disputes, complaints about delays, anything mentioning legal action |
| Travel and hospitality | Invoice requests, booking confirmations | Refund and compensation requests, complaints about a stay |
| Insurance | Document receipts, claim status updates | Coverage questions on a disputed claim, complaints, anything that may reach the regulator |
Emails the agent should not answer at all, such as a claim involving serious injury, are handed to your team with a brief instead of drafted.
What happens to your team's edits
Every approval, edit and rejection is recorded against the conversation, with who made it and when. The customer record shows the reply as sent, and the audit trail shows the draft it came from.
Edits are useful evidence. When your team keeps changing the same phrase, or adding the same explanation, we review it with you and update the agent's approved wording or rules. The change is tested and goes live through the normal release process, with your approval. See How changes go live.
Moving categories to direct sending
Once your team is confident in a category, it can switch that category to direct sending. A common approach is to start with every category under review, then move routine ones across one at a time, keeping disputes and complaints under review for as long as they choose.
- You decide, category by category. Nothing moves to direct sending unless your team switches it.
- You can see the evidence first. Every draft in the category, and whether it was approved unchanged, edited or rejected, can be found and read in the console, so the decision rests on your own conversations.
- You can switch back. Any category can return to review at any time.
- Oversight continues. Replies sent directly are still recorded and can be checked in quality review. See Quality review on every conversation.
In practice
Sahel Crest Properties, a Dubai developer, connects its customer care mailbox with every category held for review.
- Mariam emails to ask why her service charge has risen. The agent drafts a reply with the amount from the property management system, the date the notice was sent, and the notice attached.
- A customer care officer checks the draft against the sources, adds a sentence about the building's new security contract, and sends it.
- Over the following weeks, the team approves most payment schedule replies unchanged, and edits most service charge replies to add context about the building budget.
- The head of customer care moves payment schedule requests to direct sending. Service charge queries stay under review.
- The team's added sentence on building budgets becomes part of the approved service charge wording, after testing and the head of customer care's approval.
What your team controls
- Which mailboxes and categories are held for review, and which are sent directly.
- Who can approve, edit and reject drafts.
- When a category moves to direct sending, and when it moves back.
- The approved wording the agent uses in each category.