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Set up channel-specific SLAs

Use the assignment matrix (team + channel scoring) to give each channel its own response targets — chat gets minutes, email gets hours, voice routes to a different policy entirely. Without duplicating the rest of your SLA setup.

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Set up channel-specific SLAs

Different channels have different reasonable response expectations. Customers tolerate hours of email turnaround but expect minutes on live chat. Atender’s assignment system lets one policy apply to one set of channels, another policy apply to others, with deterministic resolution when scopes overlap.

How the matrix works

A policy is attached to conversations via an assignment. Each assignment specifies a team, a channel, or both. The most specific match per metric type wins:

  • Team + channel — 3 — Highest specificity — beats team-only or channel-only
  • Team only — 2 — Used when no team+channel match exists
  • Channel only — 1 — Fallback when only the channel matches

So a conversation routed to the Premium team on the Email channel will, in order of preference:

  1. Use a policy assigned to Premium + Email if one exists.
  2. Otherwise use a policy assigned to Premium (any channel).
  3. Otherwise use a policy assigned to Email (any team).
  4. Otherwise — no SLA applies.

This lets you set defaults broadly and override narrowly, without policy duplication.

Before you start

  • A Standard Support policy already exists (create one)
  • Admin permissions on SLA Policies
  • Teams configured if you’ll use team-level assignments (Settings → Teams)

Steps — common scenario: chat needs faster targets than email

  1. Open Settings → SLA Policies.
  2. Click New policy. Name it Chat Standard. Description: Faster targets for live-chat conversations.
  3. Set the metric targets — chat-friendly numbers, e.g. First Reply: Low=0 / Normal=2m / High=10m / Urgent=30m.
  4. Under Channel Assignment, pick Web Chat only. Leave teams empty.
  5. Save.

Now chat conversations get the faster policy automatically; email and other channels continue to use Standard Support (which has Web Chat NOT in its assignments).

Verify: The Standard Support policy’s Channel Assignment should NOT include Web Chat (or its score-1 channel-only match would compete with Chat Standard). When two channel-only assignments target the same channel, the resolution is undefined — keep them disjoint.

Steps — common scenario: Premium team needs faster targets across all channels

  1. Open Standard Support. Confirm its Team Assignment is empty (i.e., it’s the channel-level default).
  2. Click New policy. Name it Premium. Description: Faster targets for the Premium team across all channels.
  3. Set the metric targets — premium-tier numbers.
  4. Under Team Assignment, pick Premium only. Leave channels empty.
  5. Save.

Now any conversation assigned to the Premium team uses Premium (score 2, beats Standard Support’s channel-only score 1). Other team conversations continue with Standard Support.

Steps — combining: Premium on Web Chat needs the fastest of all

  1. Click New policy. Name it Premium Chat. Description: Premium-tier targets, chat-optimized.
  2. Set the metric targets — even faster than Premium’s chat-relevant numbers.
  3. Under Team Assignment, pick Premium. Under Channel Assignment, pick Web Chat.
  4. Save.

Resolution per conversation:

  • Premium team + Web Chat — Premium Chat (score 3)
  • Premium team + Email — Premium (score 2)
  • General team + Web Chat — Chat Standard (score 1)
  • General team + Email — Standard Support (score 1)

Verify it worked

  1. Pick a representative conversation for each scope (Premium-on-chat, Premium-on-email, General-on-chat, General-on-email).
  2. Check the SLA badge on each. The remaining-time targets should match the policy you expected for that scope.
  3. If the wrong policy is winning, recount the assignment scores — usually two assignments tie and the resolver picks unpredictably.

Don’t overlap channel-only with channel-only

The biggest footgun: two policies, both with Team Assignment empty, both with the same channel listed. Both score 1 on a conversation that channel routes to. The system picks one but the choice isn’t well-defined. Fix by either narrowing one to a team, or merging the policies.

Troubleshooting

  • Symptom: Conversation gets no SLA at all even though policies exist. Fix: No assignment matched. Check that one of the active policies has the conversation’s team or channel in its assignment list.
  • Symptom: A premium-team conversation uses the standard policy. Fix: The Premium policy’s Team Assignment is empty or has the wrong team name. Open the policy and confirm.

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