Plan requirement
| Subscription | Any plan |
| Access | Agent |
A reply to a closed ticket cannot reopen it. Zendesk creates a new one instead, linked to the old, and that surprises people.
Solved reopens, closed does not
While a ticket is Solved, a reply from the customer puts it straight back to Open. That window lasts until Zendesk closes the ticket automatically: four days by default, retimable up to the 28-day ceiling.
After that the ticket is locked. Nothing can be added to it, by anyone. A reply produces a follow-up ticket carrying a reference to the original.
What a follow-up ticket looks like
- A new ticket number, with the original's subject and a note saying which ticket it follows.
- A fresh status, so it enters your queue like any other ticket.
- By default, no assignee or group from the original, which means it can land somewhere unexpected.
That last point catches teams out. A customer replying to a specialist six weeks later does not reach that specialist; the ticket goes to whatever your routing does with a new one.
There is a setting for it, off by default: Copy original assignee and group to follow-up ticket, under Objects and rules, then Tickets, then Settings, then Assignments and notifications. Turn it on and the follow-up reaches the person who handled the original.
Do not be alarmed by how it looks: with the setting on, the Assignee field still appears blank on the new ticket and only fills in on submission. Where the original assignee has left, the group is copied and your normal rules pick the assignee; where both are gone, the rules decide both.
The window is a real decision
A short window closes tickets quickly and produces more follow-ups. A long one keeps conversations reopenable but leaves solved tickets hanging around. Neither is wrong; what matters is that it matches how long your customers take to come back.
Comments
0 comments
Article is closed for comments.