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Send text and email messages

The Inbox is where you text and email customers and where everything they send back lands. Open Inbox in the sidebar; the badge on the sidebar item counts conversations with unread messages, capped at 99+. Reading the Inbox requires Communications read permission and sending requires Communications create; see Assign Shop Roles, shop access, and User Permissions.

One conversation per customer, every channel in it​

A customer has exactly one Conversation per shop. It holds the whole history in a single timeline: texts, emails, web chats from your website widget, and phone activity as call summaries and voicemails. There is no separate SMS thread and email thread to flip between; each bubble is labeled with its channel, time, and, for outbound texts and emails, a delivery status (queued, sent, delivered, or failed). When a message was tied to a Repair Order or vehicle, those show as badges in the conversation header.

Every outbound message goes to one specific phone or email Contact Point on the customer, not to "the customer" in the abstract. What Contact Points are and how to manage them is covered in Manage customer communication details, Additional people, labels, and credit settings; picking the right person when a customer has several is covered in Communicate with multiple Customer Contacts.

Find and read a conversation​

The list on the left puts unread conversations first, then sorts by latest activity. Search matches the customer name, the number or address, the RO and vehicle context, and the latest message preview. The channel tabs (All, SMS, Email, Phone, Web chat) slice the list by where each conversation currently lives, meaning its latest message's channel. New messages appear in place as they arrive; there is nothing to refresh.

Unread state is shared by the whole shop. A conversation counts as unread until anyone at the shop opens it, and opening it clears the badge for everyone. There is no per-user unread and no assigning or claiming of conversations.

Send a text​

  1. Open the conversation. The composer defaults to the channel the conversation last moved on; switch it to SMS in the chooser under the message box if needed.
  2. If the customer has more than one SMS-capable phone Contact Point, a Send to picker appears next to the chooser. It defaults to the number the conversation has been using.
  3. Type the message and select Send.

The bubble's status moves from queued to sent to delivered as the carrier confirms it. A failed status means it did not go through; see Resolve message-delivery and consent problems.

Customers text photos in all the time, and those arrive as attachments in the timeline. Sending media out is rougher today: the paper-clip on the SMS composer adds a media URL row, where you paste a public link to the file plus its name, content type, and a link expiry, up to 10 per message. There is no upload-from-computer for texts, so when the file only exists on your machine, email is the practical channel.

When texting is blocked, the composer disables itself and names the reason in place. The reason is either shop-side (texting isn't set up yet, next section) or recipient-side: the person opted out with STOP or is otherwise suppressed. Consent and suppression are covered in Resolve message-delivery and consent problems.

Text a customer who has never messaged you​

The Inbox has no compose-from-scratch button. A conversation exists once something has happened on it: the customer texted, emailed, or web-chatted in, a phone call connected in either direction, or you used the Call action on the customer detail page, which creates the conversation if there isn't one. Once the conversation exists, you can compose on any channel the customer has a Contact Point for, whether or not they have ever used that channel.

What number your texts send from​

Texts send from your shop's communications number, listed on the Configurations > Customer Experience > Communications. Before it can send, the number must be SMS-active and tied to a Legal SMS Sender: the organization-managed record of the real business behind your messages, which the BayEngine team verifies and registers with carriers. Until that registration is done, an empty Inbox shows "Set up texting" with the blocking reason and a link into SMS settings. Legal SMS Senders live in organization configuration (see Organization defaults and shop overrides); if registration seems stuck, contact the BayEngine team.

Send an email​

Switch the composer to Email. When the conversation already has an email in it, the composer defaults to replying: the subject is derived as "Re:" the message you are replying to, and the email threads into the customer's mail client as a reply rather than a new message. The reply arrow on any email bubble replies to that specific message. New email switches to a fresh subject line of your own instead.

The email body supports formatting, and you can attach files with the paper clip or by pasting a screenshot straight into the message, up to 10 attachments and 7 MB total per email. If the customer has several email addresses, a Send to picker chooses which one.

Emails send from your shop's own address, created from the shop name on the BayEngine mail domain when the BayEngine team sets your shop up for email. Customer replies to it land back in the same conversation. This is the same sender behind automatic mail like the online-booking confirmation email, so if the composer says the shop has no active email address, neither is going out; ask the BayEngine team to finish email setup.

Text or email a document​

Estimates, inspection results, and invoices have their own Send action on the document, covered in Send Estimates, Inspections, and Invoices. One difference is worth knowing from the Inbox side: a document Send by Text delivers the message and its automatically added Portal Link through the same SMS pipeline as the Inbox, so it appears as a bubble with delivery status. Estimate and inspection messages can be edited before sending; invoice wording remains fixed. Document Send emails deliver directly but do not yet appear as conversation bubbles.

A text or email from a number or address that isn't on any customer opens a conversation tagged Unresolved contact point, with a banner offering to link it to an Existing customer or create a New one. Web chat visitors who left a name on the widget form get that name prefilled. Linking attaches the number or address to the customer as a customer-level Contact Point and folds the messages into that customer's conversation, so the history stays reachable. The record side of this is covered in Manage customer communication details, Additional people, labels, and credit settings.

Calls and details live here too​

The phone icon in the conversation header calls the customer through your browser on the shop's line; it is hidden or disabled until the shop's voice line is set up on the Communications tab. Completed calls, missed calls, and voicemails all land in the same timeline as the texts and emails. The Details button opens a side panel with the customer's Contact Points, the current SMS consent state shared by the person you are texting, and the conversation's Repair Order and vehicle, so mid-thread questions like "what were we promised for pickup?" don't require leaving the Inbox.

Outbound web chat is the one channel with a catch: you can only reply on it after the visitor has written in, and your reply appears in their widget the next time it checks in, not as a push to their phone.