If a request goes unanswered or cannot be delivered

An Ask a person step does not give up when a person is quiet or a message cannot be sent. It asks each person in the Bizomate app, then by email, keeps the request on their Requests page throughout, and if nobody answers in time the run goes down the No answer path. This article covers what happens on the way, and what the run says.

The step asks in the Bizomate app — the Requests page and the bell — on Slack, Microsoft Teams, Telegram and SMS for people who linked them, and by email, always last, in each person's own order. WhatsApp and RCS come next.

Who can do this

Workspace Admins and Editors set the timings and the No answer path. Anyone in the workspace can read the run.

Steps

Set what happens when nobody answers

1. Open the Ask a person step.
2. In Try the next channel after, choose 5 min, 15 min (the default) or 1 hour.
3. In If nobody answers in, choose 1 hour, 4 hours, 24 hours (the default), 3 days or 7 days. Then the run goes down the No answer path.
4. On the canvas, add steps to the No answer path — for example an email reminder to Rohan Mehta, or a message to the team. Those steps can use noAnswer, which is true on this path.

See what happened on a run

1. Open the run. While the step waits, the run's page says This run is waiting, not stuck. It carries on as soon as someone answers, or down No answer if nobody does in time., and the step shows Waiting for an answer.
2. Open the Ask a person step to read its record. Each thing that happened is a line of its own:
   • Asked … in the Bizomate app. — one line for each person.
   • Waiting for an answer until … UTC.
   • … didn't answer in the Bizomate app in … minutes, so it went to email.
   • Couldn't reach … in … — it could not be sent. … — see the table below.
   • Answered — …, by … in ….
   • Nobody answered in time, so it went down No answer.

What happens next

• Each person is asked in the Bizomate app first, then by email once Try the next channel after has passed without an answer. With Only these channels, only the channels ticked are used — with only Email ticked, the email goes at once.
• A message that cannot be sent is skipped at once. The next channel is tried straight away, rather than after Try the next channel after, and the run says which channel failed.
• If no channel can reach a person, the request waits for them on their Requests page, and the run says so.
• Every request is on the Requests page the whole time, whatever the channels did.
• When If nobody answers in runs out, the request closes, the step's record says Nobody answered in time, so it went down No answer., and the run goes down No answer. If that path has no steps, the run ends there. Anyone who opens the request then sees Nobody answered in time, so the run went down No answer.

Good to know

• No answer is always a path, whatever answers you define.
• With Everyone, if nobody rejects and not everyone has approved in time, the run goes down No answer. The approvals already given are not passed on to that path.
• Email is always the last channel.
• A test run stops after 5 minutes, waits included. If nobody answers by then, the test stops with This test run stopped after 5 minutes., so the No answer path cannot be tried in a test. A request in a test still goes to the real people asked. See Testing a workflow before you publish it.
• People who have left the workspace are passed over when the step asks. If nobody it names is still a member, the step fails.

If something goes wrong

Related

• Ask a person for an approval or an answer
• Answer a request
• Choose where you answer requests
• What each run status means
• Stop a run