This article will help you understand the logic of different enquiry distribution modes and how does the queue work.

• If the enquiry has not been accepted by the agent, it is forwarded to the next agent in the queue. If no one in the queue accepted the enquiry, it will be redirected to the beginning of the queue again.
• If an agent that meets the specified criteria is not found, the enquiry will remain undistributed. In this case, the client gets the notification that none of the agents can respond to his/her enquiry. There is an important feature: if there is no agent responsible for the enquiry, the client will be displayed as a responsible person for the CRM record (as any CRM record must have a person responsible for it).
• Check that an agent is online when routing enquiries - if this option is enabled, the system will check if the agent is not dismissed, is not on leave, is online (or has clocked in).

  If the Working Time Management option is enabled, the system will check if the employee is not on break or hasn't clocked out. If the employee is on break or has clocked out, the system will treat him/her as unavailable for routing enquiries.

  If the Working Time Management option is disabled or is not available on your Bitrix24 plan, the system will check if the agent status is online/offline.

• If an agent works with Bitrix24 in a browser and there are no problems with the Internet connection, the agent will be treated as having the "online" status.

  If an agent uses the Bitrix24 Desktop app, the system will use the Desktop app to check the agent status. If the agent doesn't perform any actions on his/her computer for 25 minutes (3 minutes if you have Bitrix24 On-Premise) or locks his/her computer, the user will have the Away for N minutes status, and he/she will be treated as having the "offline" status.

  Away and Don't disturb statuses that can be selected manually don't affect the online/offline status check.

• The following criteria have to be met for the enquiry to be directed to the employee:
  • The employee is not dismissed
  • The employee is not on vacation
  • The employee is online (if the corresponding option is activated)
  • The employee has clocked in and is not having a break
  • The maximum number of enquiries per agent has not been reached (if the corresponding option is activated).
• The wait time before the enquiry is redirected to the next employee is based on the time period specified in the settings. If the enquiry has not been distributed, the system tries to distribute it every 2 minutes.
• When redirecting the enquiry to the employee that is responsible for this client in CRM, the same conditions must be met as when redirecting to an employee from the queue, except for the "Maximum enquiries per agent" and "online/offline" conditions.
• The enquiries, which were assigned to dismissed employees or employees on vacation, return to the queue and are distributed again once in 24 hours.
• Enquiries are automatically closed when more than 30 days have elapsed since the last message (even undistributed enquiries).

Features of "Evenly" type of distribution

It may seem that enquiries are actually not distributed evenly when the Evenly distribution mode is selected.

The main goal of that algorithm is to provide the customer with an agent's response as soon as possible, not to distribute an even number of enquires between agents in the queue. The algorithm tracks time since the last response for each agent. Then it passes the dialogue to the agent with a longer period passed since the previous reply and starts tracking time again. This eliminates a constant flow of chats to one agent (considering all other conditions being equal for agents in the queue). If distributing goes only among several agents then there is(are) reason(s) for that.

Exceptions might depend on Open Channel settings: e.g. passing enquires, redirecting to other agent, going offline, working day pauses. The main criterion, however, is online\offline status. If agents are online, only they will get new chats, other (offline) employees will not get any incoming sessions. The system will direct chats to all people in the queue only if they all are online/offline.