Managing the statuses available to agents

Which statuses agents can choose from. Fewer is better, and two of the four defaults cannot be removed at all.

Which statuses agents can choose from. Fewer is better, and every one on the list should change either the routing or somebody's decision. Two of the four defaults cannot be removed at all.

Review the list

1. In Admin Center, click Objects and rules in the sidebar, then select Omnichannel routing > Agent statuses.
2. Hide Away or Transfers only if your workflow genuinely does not use them.
3. Delete any custom status that fails the test below, from the options menu next to it.
4. Check the group restriction on the custom statuses you keep.

What you can and cannot change

Editing a custom status does not change the status of any agent who is using it at that moment, so a rename does not shake anybody out of what they selected.

Restricting a status to groups

When you create a custom status you choose All groups or Only selected groups. That is how a phone team gets statuses an email team does not, and it keeps each list short without removing what anybody needs.

Check what you inherited: custom statuses created before 10 June 2024 are available to all groups unless an admin edits them to restrict access. Anything created since then had the choice made deliberately.

The test for keeping one

Does it change what work reaches the agent, or does somebody act on it? If the answer to both is no, it is a label rather than a status.

Four or five is plenty. A long list means agents pick approximately, and approximate statuses are worse than fewer accurate ones. Statuses for lunch, training, coaching, admin and email each look reasonable and together turn the picker into a timesheet, at which point agents either ignore it or spend their attention on it.

Explain what each one does

Not what it is called: what happens when you select it. "Transfers only means no new conversations, but a colleague can still hand one to you" is what makes it used correctly, and the same goes for away, which still receives email tickets.

See also

• Creating custom agent statuses
• What unified agent statuses are
• Idle timeout and disconnection settings