Email replies
Turn email into a two-way support channel - reply to offline customers by email and receive their answers and files back in the same conversation.
Email works as a built-in channel for every agent: nothing to connect and nothing to install. When a customer is not around to chat, your reply reaches them by email, and their answer flows straight back into the same conversation in your inbox, like a help desk.
What it does
- Reply by email when the customer is offline. From the inbox, send an agent reply and Fetchply delivers it to the customer email saved on the conversation. Every emailed reply includes a timeline of the recent conversation history, showing who said what and when, so the customer always has the context that led to your answer.
- Customer replies come back to the conversation. When the customer answers the email from their own mailbox, the answer appears in the same conversation as a new customer message. A resolved conversation reopens automatically, and your team is notified like for any new message.
- Follow-ups stay in the same email thread. Once a customer has answered by email, your next replies arrive as replies in that same thread in their mailbox (with a "Re:" subject), instead of starting a new email conversation each time.
- Start a conversation from an email address. Select the plus button in the inbox list to begin a conversation with a customer email address.
- Attachments travel both ways. Files you attach to an emailed reply are sent with the email (up to 5 files and 10 MB in total per reply). Files the customer attaches to their answer appear in the conversation with their message.
Sending replies by email
Open a conversation, write your reply, and choose email delivery. If the conversation already has a customer email in Conversation details, Fetchply uses it; otherwise you are asked to add one or send in chat only.
Use Set email subject from the conversation actions menu to control the subject line used for every emailed reply in that conversation, so the thread stays consistent in the customer's mailbox. After the customer has replied by email, follow-up replies keep the same subject with a "Re:" prefix and are delivered into the same email thread automatically.
Emailed replies support text and file attachments. Voice recordings cannot be emailed; send them in chat instead.
Receiving customer replies
Incoming replies are cleaned up before they reach the inbox so conversations stay readable:
- Only the customer's newest message is added. Quoted history and email signatures are removed.
- Files the customer attached appear with the message. Supported types are images, PDF, Word documents, plain text, and audio or video clips, with up to 5 files of at most 10 MB each per reply. Unsupported or oversized files are left out while the message itself still arrives.
- Inline images from email signatures are ignored on purpose.
Safety rules
- A reply is only accepted when it is sent from the customer email saved on the conversation. Nobody can write into a conversation from a forwarded email or a different address.
- Automatic responses, such as out-of-office notices and mailing-list mail, are ignored.
- Incoming files are checked against their actual content, not just their claimed type. Mislabeled or executable files never reach your inbox.
Limits
| Limit | Value |
|---|---|
| Files per emailed reply (sent or received) | 5 |
| Size per received file | 10 MB |
| Total attachment size per sent email | 10 MB |
| Conversation history included in each emailed reply | last 10 messages |
Troubleshooting
The customer is offline and email cannot be sent
Confirm the email address in Conversation details is correct. If Fetchply reports that email delivery is unavailable, choose Send in chat only to keep the reply in the conversation, then ask the workspace owner to check email delivery before retrying.
A customer's email reply does not appear in the conversation
Check that the reply was sent from the same email address saved in Conversation details; replies from any other address are not added. Automatic responses, such as out-of-office notices, are also ignored on purpose. If the address matches and the reply still does not appear after a few minutes, ask the workspace owner to confirm that incoming email replies are set up for your workspace.
A file from a customer's email reply is missing
The customer's message arrives even when a file cannot be kept. A file is left out when it is larger than 10 MB, when its type is not supported (for example installers or archives), or when more than 5 files were attached to one email. Very large emails may not be accepted at all; ask the customer to send files under the limits or share a download link instead.
My attachments are rejected when sending by email
Keep the total size of all attached files under 10 MB per emailed reply, or choose chat-only delivery for large files. Voice recordings are not supported by email.
An emailed reply does not show the whole conversation
This is expected for long conversations: the history timeline in an emailed reply includes only the last 10 messages, and an unusually long single message is shortened. To send the complete history, use Email chat transcript from the conversation actions menu.
My reply started a new email thread instead of continuing the old one
Replies can only join an existing thread after the customer has answered at least once by email. The very first email in a conversation always starts a new thread, and if the customer has never replied, follow-up emails keep the same subject but may appear separately depending on their email app. Once the customer replies, your next emails continue that thread.
For day-to-day inbox work such as claiming, resolving, and reopening conversations, see Take over a conversation.