Glossary
Customer support glossary
Plain-English definitions of the concepts behind AI-powered customer support — from triage to auto-resolve, written for teams evaluating their first AI helpdesk.
What is a shared inbox?A shared inbox is a collaborative messaging workspace that unifies email, WhatsApp, Slack, Discord, and other channels into a single interface where teams can read, assign, and reply to messages.
What is AI triage?AI triage analyzes incoming support tickets, assigns labels, sets priority, and routes them to the right team within seconds of arrival.
What is AI auto-resolve?AI auto-resolve is automated ticket resolution for routine questions. It answers from your knowledge base, cites sources, and escalates unclear or sensitive tickets to humans.
What is an AI sidekick for support agents?An AI sidekick is the agent-assist layer inside a support inbox: summaries, reply drafts, source suggestions, and next actions while humans stay in control.
What are AI credits?AI credits are the unit of measurement for AI actions in Protodesk. Most actions cost one credit; heavier actions like multi-variant Suggest and auto-resolve cost two.
What is an AI customer support agent?An AI customer support agent can read tickets, draft replies, resolve routine questions, and escalate complex cases inside a helpdesk or shared inbox.
What is a knowledge base?A knowledge base is a structured library of answers, guides, and policies that helps customers self-serve and gives AI a trusted source for support replies.
What is an SLA?An SLA defines target response and resolution times for support tickets, often based on priority, team, customer tier, or business hours.
What are canned responses?Canned responses are pre-written reply templates agents insert into common support replies, often through slash shortcuts and variables.
What is omnichannel support?Omnichannel support unifies communication channels into one consistent support experience, so context follows the customer across email, WhatsApp, Slack, Discord, and more.
What is a help center?A help center is a public self-service portal where customers find articles, search for answers, browse FAQs, and contact support when self-service is not enough.
What is CSAT?CSAT, or Customer Satisfaction Score, measures how happy a customer is with a specific support interaction, transaction, or experience.
What is support ticket triage?Support ticket triage is the process of sorting new customer conversations by topic, urgency, owner, and next action.
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