How replies are routed

Why it has to be worked out

Your customers hear from Queue Join’s own numbers, chosen by where their phone is from — see sender numbers. The same numbers receive replies. Because every business shares them, a reply can only be matched to a business from what has been sent to that customer recently.

We send it to the business the customer has been dealing with. Usually that is obvious: they joined your waitlist an hour ago and are replying to “It’s your turn”. When it isn’t, we don’t guess.

Each location counts as a business of its own here. A customer with visits at two of your branches is treated just like a customer of two separate businesses.

How the business is chosen

We only look at messages sent to the customer’s number from the number they wrote to, and take the first of these that applies:

1. The message they replied to. On WhatsApp a customer can reply to one particular message, and the location that sent it gets the reply.
2. A conversation already under way. If they have an open conversation with a location, with a message either way in the last 7 days, the reply joins it, unless another business has messaged them from that number since.
3. One open visit. If exactly one location has them waiting or booked, that location gets the reply.
4. Several open visits. If several locations do, we don’t guess. None of them gets the reply, and the customer gets an automatic answer.
5. The last business to message them. Otherwise, the location that last messaged them from that number in the last 7 days gets the reply.
6. Nobody. If none of these applies, the customer gets an automatic answer.

A closed conversation, or one that has been quiet for more than 7 days, stays readable but no longer draws replies to itself. The next message is matched afresh, and opens the conversation again if it comes back to you.

What the customer hears instead

When nobody can read a reply, the customer gets an automatic answer, which depends on what we know:

• It reached a business without Customer messaging — on Free or Starter, or with it turned off there. The answer names the business, says it doesn’t read replies to these messages, and gives the link to the customer’s visit if they have one, and the location’s phone number.
• Several businesses have open visits with them. The answer says we couldn’t tell which business the message is for, and asks them to use the link in that business’s latest message, or to phone them. It names no business.
• Nothing matched. The answer says we couldn’t tell which business the message is for, and asks them to contact the business directly.

A number gets at most one automatic answer in 24 hours, so two automated systems can’t keep answering each other, and none goes to a number that has opted out. Automatic answers don’t use any business’s messages.

None of these replies is kept. A message nobody could be matched to, or one that reached a business without Customer messaging, can’t be read later by anyone.

STOP, START and CANCEL

Replies asking to stop are dealt with before anything else, as they always have been: the customer is opted out of messages from every business on Queue Join, and START opts them back in. A STOP or START that reaches your business still appears in the conversation, with an Opted out or Opted in again note beside it.

CANCEL on its own is one of the words that opts out. A customer who replies just “Cancel”, hoping to cancel a booking, is opted out of all messages, and the booking stands. If they have a visit with you, phone them to check what they meant.

A customer who has opted out can still write to you. Their messages are matched and kept as normal, and alert your team, but nothing can be sent back, so phone them if you need to answer. See STOP, and what happens next.

Replies from abroad

Customers whose number is from outside the US and Canada get texts from the UK number. For a customer outside the UK, replying to it by SMS may cost them an international rate, and some networks may not carry the reply at all. Replies by WhatsApp or RCS don’t have that problem.

If a message reaches the wrong business

If a message clearly isn’t meant for you — it mentions an appointment you don’t have, or a business you aren’t — don’t act on it, and don’t share anything about your bookings or other customers in reply. Growth and above

1. Reply once, starting with your business name, to say they have reached you and should contact the business they meant directly.
2. Then close the conversation.

Needs the permission messages.send (send messages). Owners and Admins have every permission by default.

There is no way to pass a conversation on to another business, because we can’t tell which one it was meant for either.