Take over a chat conversation

The Chat human handover skill lets your team handle WhatsApp, Messenger and website-chat messages, including voice notes. It does not apply to audio calls.

Add the skill in the bot configuration. Click Colleagues available for handover, search by name or email, then select a suggestion: their name and avatar appear as a tag in the field. Add more colleagues the same way and use the tag's cross to remove a selection. Selected people are not suggested again. Only active colleagues from your organisation who have access to the bot are available.

Explain when the assistant should offer a person, then save at the top right. All handover settings belong to this skill; the WhatsApp, Messenger and Website chat skills configure their channels. Inactivity before returning to the bot is shared by the three channels, between 1 and 10,080 minutes. Reminder and session-closure settings remain the common platform settings.

Bot behaviour and existing settings

In Bot behaviour, Allow AI to request a human handover is directly visible alongside the instructions and the inactivity period. Turn it off to keep only manual handovers without deleting the selected team or instructions. Open the inbox, in the panel header, gives access to conversations and notifications. Save your changes with the bot's Save button at the top right. Removing the skill from the bot retains its configuration; the skill must be active for the AI to request a person. Instructions can contain up to 10,000 characters.

Existing WhatsApp and Messenger teams, instructions and inactivity settings move to the dedicated skill. An already saved shared configuration takes precedence. Channels no longer expose a separate editable inactivity setting.

WhatsApp handover uses the same queue and browser notifications as Messenger and website chat. WhatsApp-specific alerts, collective decisions and device confirmations have been removed; no WhatsApp notification number or template needs configuring. Existing human handovers and their history are retained in the shared mechanism.

For a number shared with the WhatsApp Business phone app, a team reply sent directly in WhatsApp also triggers human handover. BeAI keeps messages received from Meta in the history and the AI stops responding. Each new human exchange extends the shared inactivity deadline; the next incoming message after expiry can start a new bot session. This detection requires Meta to forward Business app messages for the connected number.

Waiting for a colleague

Maximum wait for a colleague is configurable from 1 to 60 minutes, with a 2-minute default. AI replies and tools stop immediately during the wait; BeAI sends the waiting message. New incoming messages remain in the history and do not extend the deadline.

Selected colleagues with active browser notifications receive an immediate alert and reminders every 15 seconds, until someone claims the conversation or the deadline expires. Browser and device notification permission is required; expired or removed subscriptions receive no alerts.

If nobody claims in time, BeAI sends an apology explaining that no colleague was available and that the bot is available again. The bot responds to new incoming messages without replaying interrupted tools. This waiting deadline is separate from Inactivity before returning to the bot, which applies only after a person actually takes over.

Enable notifications

Open Human support in the menu, then select Enable notifications. Your browser asks permission. Activation is specific to each device. A red warning indicates that browser notifications are disabled; the Team panel shows a green or red dot for each colleague. If notifications are blocked, authorise them in the website's browser settings. HTTPS and a compatible browser are required.

Only selected colleagues who remain authorised receive the notification. It links to the queue without exposing conversation text. Receiving a notification does not mean that the conversation has already been claimed.

Claim, reply and transfer

The assistant creates a request under Unassigned, immediately pauses and sends a message asking the contact to wait. Click Take this conversation: it is assigned to you, and the AI stops replying and using tools for this session. If someone else claimed it first, the queue refreshes.

Your contact receives “Camille has taken over your conversation.”, using the name of the assigned colleague. The message is saved in the history on WhatsApp, Messenger and website chat. A transfer to another colleague also announces their name. Pending requests do not send this announcement. If no name is configured, it says “A member of our team”; email addresses are not published. The announcement follows the conversation language (French or English), falling back to the bot's language.

The announcement uses the same delivery rules as your replies. Its history entry shows refusal or uncertainty; assignment remains effective even when the channel refuses the announcement. Repeated clicks do not resend it, and an interrupted send is not retried automatically.

You can write, attach a file, listen to or prepare a voice note, and use emojis. Listen to voice-note previews before sending. Exchanges remain in BeAI history. Reactions are available on website chat and WhatsApp. Messenger retains incoming reactions, but its sending interface does not let BeAI publish a remote reaction; an agent's reaction remains visible in BeAI.

Transfer to a colleague preserves the conversation and changes its assignee. Return to the assistant prepares the assistant to resume on the next incoming message, without resending messages or replaying actions. Each exchange during human support extends the inactivity deadline. After expiry, the next incoming message starts a new AI session; previous history is retained.

Close a chat

The assigned colleague, or an administrator who can access the bot, can select Close chat under Details and team. Administrators can also close an Unassigned request without claiming it. The confirmation explains that a closing message will be sent and warns if an unsent draft will be discarded. Cancel keeps both the draft and the conversation.

While closing, replying, transferring and returning the conversation to the assistant are unavailable. Once Closed, it remains accessible under All, including attachments and the full-history link. The customer's next message starts a new session with the assistant. Website-chat drafts entered during the brief closing phase are kept and can be sent after closure finishes.

Closing the history and sending the closing message have separate outcomes. The provider accepted the closing message means acceptance by the channel; it does not guarantee that the customer read it. If sending is refused or uncertain, the conversation still closes and the interface explains the outcome without claiming delivery. Check closure status refreshes the state without sending a second message. If the request was not confirmed and the server has not recorded any closure, Retry this closure retries only that same operation with the same reference. No resend happens automatically.

Limits and errors

WhatsApp and Messenger retain their provider reply windows. A visible conversation may therefore be too old to send a reply. Attachments are limited to five files, 10 MiB each and 18 MiB per message; voice notes to three minutes and videos to one minute. A refusal is explained. If the result of sending is uncertain, check history before attempting another send.

Locked users, colleagues removed from the team and users whose bot access was revoked can no longer claim, reply or receive new notifications.

API

The same operations are available under /api/v1/chat-inbox: reading, messages, assignment, transfer, return to the assistant, closure, reactions, presence and browser subscriptions. Decisions include the current version. Sending retains a stable client_id. Closure sends both fields to POST /api/v1/chat-inbox/{id}/close; retrying the same reference retrieves its result without sending another message. Configure the skill under /api/v1/bots/{id}/skills/chat-human-takeover. Consult the API documentation for formats, permissions and multipart files. WhatsApp's old human_takeover configuration and whatsapp_compatibility options are rejected. Use the dedicated skill. Messenger's inactivity_timeout_minutes remains a deprecated alias for the shared timeout for existing API clients.