# The inbox

> What lands in the inbox, who sees what, and how to clear it, from approving the agent's drafts to answering its questions and calling families back.

The inbox is the list of things that need a person. The agent, your website and
your phone line put them there: a draft to approve, a question the agent should
not answer alone, a family to call back. You deal with each one, and it leaves
the list.

When the inbox is empty, nothing is waiting on you.

It is not a history of every conversation. That lives on each case, on the
**Agent** tab, where every email, call and note is kept in order.

## What lands in the inbox

| Item | What it is | What you do |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Approve email | A draft the agent wrote to a family or a supplier | Edit it, then approve and send, or discard it |
| The agent needs a decision | A question only your team can answer, such as a date that differs from eLys | Answer the agent, or mark it done |
| First Call | A family told your website someone just passed, or is close to passing, and left a way to reach them | Call them |
| Wants to talk now | A family asked on your website to speak to someone straight away | Call them back if nobody picked up |
| Call back | A website contact form, or a message left with the website assistant or the phone receptionist | Call or email them |
| Condolence to review | A condolence posted on one of your obituaries | Publish or hide it |
| Email did not go out | An email that failed to send or bounced | Try again, or check the address on the case |
| Message from the family | A family wrote through their portal | Answer them by phone or email, then mark it done |

## How it is laid out

The list is on the left, the item you are looking at on the right.

(Screenshot: The Lethra inbox. On the left, two urgent items, three items under For you and one under Team. On the right, the agent's draft reply to a family, with the family's question above it and Approve & send and Discard beneath it.)

The list has three sections.

- **Urgent** holds First Calls, families asking to talk now, and phone messages
  the receptionist marked urgent. Everyone at the firm sees these.
- **For you** holds everything on the cases you are responsible for: the cases
  you created, and the cases where you have an open task.
- **Team** holds everything else: items on cases shared with the whole team,
  and items not tied to a case yet, such as a website enquiry.

Each line says in plain words what is being asked, who it is about, and how
long it has been waiting. The number next to **Inbox** in the sidebar is how
many items are open.

## Dealing with an item

Open an item and what you need is on the right: the message the draft answers,
the number to call, the condolence to read. The buttons below it do the work.

### Approving a draft

(Screenshot: The draft card: the agent's reply to a family, marked From agent mailbox, with Approve & send, Discard, Use my Gmail and Save as rule beneath it.)

**Approve & send** if the draft is right. **Discard** if it is wrong, or the
situation has moved on. To change the wording first, click the text and edit it
in place: the email that goes out is exactly what you see.

Take the extra few seconds on anything sensitive. The agent writes well, but it
does not know that this particular family fell out last year.

Drafts can carry attachments, and you can add or remove them before approving.

### Answering the agent

(Screenshot: The agent's question about a date of death that differs from eLys, with a box to answer the agent, a Send to the agent button, and I'm on it and Mark done beneath.)

When the agent needs a decision, it asks one plain question. Type your answer
and choose **Send to the agent**. Your answer goes to the agent on that case,
never to the family, and the agent carries on from there. If you dealt with it
another way, choose **Mark done**.

### Calling someone back

First Calls and callbacks show the person's name, number and message. On a
phone, **Call** dials the number. Once you have spoken to them, choose **Mark
handled**.

(Screenshot: A callback in the inbox: the receptionist's summary of an after-hours call, the caller's name and number, and a button to call them back.)

## Not calling the same family twice

On anything someone has to go and do, **I'm on it** tells your colleagues you
are handling it. Your name appears on the item for everyone, so two people do
not call the same family. **Let go** takes your name off again.

## Done

Handled items move to **Done**. They stay there for 7 days, with who handled
them and how, so you can check that something was dealt with.

(Screenshot: The Done tab: an approved email, marked Approved by Demo, and a callback marked Handled by Lotte Claes.)

## Cases that are not shared

By default every case is shared with the whole team, so anyone can pick up its
items. For a case only certain people should handle, turn off **Share inbox
items with the whole team** on the case's **Agent** tab. Its items then go only
to the person who created the case and the people with open tasks on it.

This changes who is asked, not who can see the case: everyone at your firm can
still open it. To see items on cases that are not shared with you, for example
while a colleague is away, turn on **Include cases not shared with me**.

## A sensible routine

1. Start with **Urgent**. Those are families waiting on a call.
2. Clear **For you**: approve drafts and answer the agent.
3. Look at **Team** for anything nobody has picked up yet.

## Next

Give the family their own view of the case:
[Sharing with the family](/docs/getting-started/family-portal/).

Source: https://lethra.ai/docs/getting-started/the-inbox/