How tickets find their customer

The helpdesk matches people by email address. When a message arrives, it looks for a customer who has the sender's address, ignoring capital letters, among every email address saved on every profile. If one has it, the ticket goes to that customer. If nobody does, the helpdesk creates a new customer with that address and the sender's name.

An address can belong to only one customer, so a match always points to one profile.

Where the address comes from#

A reply in an existing email thread joins that ticket, even when someone else writes it, such as a person who was copied in. The ticket keeps its customer. The other writer gets a profile of their own, under their address, for later.

When a profile has no name yet and a later email carries a sender name, the helpdesk fills it in. It never replaces a name the profile already has.

When one person has two profiles#

Because matching is by address, someone who writes from a second email address, or chats without giving one, gets a second profile. Merge the two and their tickets and orders come together: see Merge customers. If a ticket alone sits on the wrong profile, change who it belongs to.

You cannot give a second profile an address the first already has; the helpdesk refuses and names the customer who holds it. That is the cue to merge.

Phone numbers#

Calls and texts are matched by phone number: a caller or texter belongs to the customer with that number on their profile, in whatever format it was saved. When nobody has it, a new customer is created and named by the number until someone renames them. See Answer and make calls and Answer texts (SMS). Email, chat and form tickets never use the phone number to decide who they belong to.

Finding the customer in Shopify#

The helpdesk does not copy your Shopify customers into its list, and an order in Shopify does not create a helpdesk customer. Instead, the store section on a ticket or customer's page finds the person in Shopify:

1. By email address: the profile's main address first, then its others, up to three in all.

2. Then by phone number, up to two.

The first Shopify customer found is the one shown. A phone number only matches in international form, such as +15551234567. Spaces, brackets, dots and dashes are ignored, and 00 in place of the + works too, but a number without its country code never matches. When the match came from a phone number, the section says Matched by phone number.

When Shopify reports a new order or a change to the customer, the store section refreshes. Nothing from Shopify changes the helpdesk profile's name, addresses or note. Orders beside each ticket covers the store section in full.

What is not available#

• Merging profiles automatically, by phone number, Shopify account or anything else. Every merge is done by hand from the customer panel.

• Matching a ticket to a customer by phone number or order number. Matching is by email address only.