Working with the agent

The agent is the colleague that takes the administrative half of a case. It reads the file, notices what is missing, prepares the work, and comes back to you when a decision or a signature is needed.

The rule that matters most is simple, so it is worth stating before anything else.

What it does on its own

These things happen without you asking.

It reads the case and keeps track of what is still open.
It drafts emails to the family, in the family’s language, from what the case already says.
It prepares documents from your templates, filling in what it knows.
It records what it learns. If a family mentions a change to the ceremony in a reply, that lands on the case, not just in a mailbox.
It remembers to come back. If it is waiting on a document or an answer, it schedules its own follow-up rather than forgetting.

What always waits for you

Emails to families are drafted, never sent automatically. They wait in the inbox under Needs your approval.
Documents are prepared, not filed. Anything official is yours to check and submit.
Nothing is shared with a family until you invite them and choose what they see.

The briefing

Each case has an Agent tab, and at the top of it is the briefing. It is the agent’s answer to “where is this case, and what should I do next?”, written fresh rather than pulled from a checklist.

It has two parts:

What matters right now is the state of the case in a few lines. The things that are unusual, late, or waiting.
Next steps is what the agent would do next, in order.

When there is genuinely nothing outstanding it says so rather than inventing work. The briefing shows when it was last updated, so you can tell whether you are looking at something written before or after this morning’s phone call.

The briefing is the fastest way back into a case you have not touched for a few days, and it is worth reading before you ring a family back.

Asking it directly

Every case has an Assistant tab with a prompt reading Ask the agent anything. It has the whole case in front of it, so you can ask in plain language rather than going to find the answer yourself.

Useful things to ask:

What is still missing from this file?
Draft a reply to the daughter about Thursday’s viewing.
What did we agree about the flowers?
Which documents do we still need before the cremation?

There is also Assistant in the main sidebar. That one is not tied to a single case, so use it for questions across the whole firm rather than about one family.

Which mailbox it sends from

Lethra can send from two places, and this catches people out, so it is worth understanding.

Your Gmail, so the family sees the message coming from you personally.
The agent mailbox, a separate address belonging to the firm.

Before you approve a draft you can see which one it will go from, and switch it for that message.

If you switch it, Lethra offers to save that as a rule. Accepting means the agent follows the same preference next time for that kind of email, so you are teaching it once rather than correcting it weekly. Most firms end up sending family correspondence from a personal Gmail and supplier or administrative email from the agent mailbox.

What it will not do

Being clear about the limits is the point of trusting it with the rest.

It does not invent facts. If the case does not say where the service is, the draft will not guess.
It does not send anything to a family on its own.
It does not decide pricing, or commit your firm to a supplier.
It does not act on a phone call it did not handle. If you agreed something on your mobile, the agent only knows once it is on the case.

Approving what it writes: The inbox.