The Inactivity Detection and Handling feature allows you to detect inactivity of end users during handovers and allows you to handle this inactivity by auto-closing the handover, configuring automated responses or trigger further actions. This feature helps to ensure that human agent's resources are being used more efficiently.
Configuring several nodes is required to use The Inactivity Detection and Handling feature:
To ensure proper detection and handling of inactivity during queue time or active handovers, follow these steps:
In the Flow editor, add the Handover to Agent Node.
Open a Node editor by clicking the Handover to Agent Node.
In the Node editor, go to the Event Settings section:
Toggle on the Send Queue Event and Send Active Event settings:
Send Queue Event - if enabled, an event is sent to the Flow once the end user enters the queue. This is a prerequisite to detect inactivity while the end user is in the queue.
Send Active Event - if enabled, an event is sent to the Flow as soon as the handover becomes active, that is when the human agent sends the first message. This is a prerequisite to detect inactivity while a handover is active.
In the Flow editor, below the Handover to Agent Node, add the Lookup Node.
Open a Node editor by clicking the Node.
In the Node editor, go to the Type setting and select Handover Status from the list.
Click Save Node.
Go to the child Nodes:
5.1 Click the Case Node.
5.3 In the Value field, specify the active handover status if you want to detect and handle inactivity while the end users are in the queue.
5.4 Click Save Node.
5.5 Click the second Case Node.
5.6 In the Value field, specify the queue handover status if you want to detect and handle inactivity while the end users are in the queue.
5.7 Click Save Node.
If you want to detect inactivity during the queue time, the first timer should be started once the end user enters the queue.
To do this, add the Once Node to start the inactivity timer when you receive the queue event:
Below the queue child Node, add Once Node.
Below the On First Time child Node, add the Set Handover Inactivity Node.
In the Set Handover Inactivity Node, specify the inactivity timeout in minutes, for example, 1. On each incoming user input, the timer is automatically reset and starts from the beginning. Once the timer expires, an inactivity event is sent to the Flow.
Click Save Node.
Repeat the same steps for the active child Node in case you want to detect and handle inactivity during active handovers.
The timer is set in minutes and may vary by up to one minute. If there is no end user input, the timer will expire after the specified time. If an end user input is received before the timeout, the timer will automatically reset and start from the beginning.
Note that after a handover has been performed, Flows (except AI Copilot Flows) are not triggered by user input, even if the Handover Status is set to queue or active. When the Handover Status is set to queue or active, Flows will only be triggered by the inactivity timeout.
Set the Go To Node to return to the Lookup Node. This moves the entrypoint to the Lookup node, allowing the Flow to execute the correct Lookup child branch based on incoming events.
In the Go To Node editor,
select Lookup from the Select Node list
and Go To Node and wait for Input from the Execution Mode list in the Advanced section.
An example of how detected inactivity could be handled is explained here:
Add the If Node at the end of the Flow.
In the Node editor, specify input.handover.inactivityCount >= 2. This allows handling the second detected inactivity differently from the first one. Note that the input.handover.inactivityCount is reset to 0 once the end user sends a message.
Below the If Node and its Else child Node, do the following to ask the end user, based on detected inactivity, if he is still there.
3.1 Add the Say Node.
3.2 In the Say Node editor, in the text field, specify Are you still there? The conversation will be automatically closed soon.
3.3 In Handover Settings > Handover Output Destination, select User to only show the message to the user and not the human agent.
3.4 Click Save Node.
3.5 Add the Set Handover Inactivity Node to start a subsequent inactivity timer.
If the inactivity count is greater than two, it triggers the close handover process, which can close the handover on both the user and human agent sides.
Below the If Node and its Then child Node, do the following to auto-close the handover after the inactivity timer expired the second time in direct succession:
4.1 Add the Close Handover Node to auto-close the handover.
4.2 Add the Say Node.
4.3. In the Say Node editor, in the text field, specify You are back with the bot now!.
4.4 In Handover Settings > Handover Output Destination, select User and Agent.
4.5 Click Save Node.
If the inactivity count is less than two,
it triggers prompt the user to respond to prevent the conversation from being automatically closed.
The Set Handover Inactivity Node will set the time period for inactivity
after which the conversation will be closed or restart a Flow from the beginning.
Finally, add the Go To Node to return to the Lookup Node as you did before. In the Go To Node editor,
select Lookup from the Select Node list
and Go To Node and wait for Input from the Execution Mode list in the Advanced section.
Test your Flow via the demo Webchat and any connected providers, for example, Cognigy Live Agent.
