A chatbot should offer to connect a visitor with a person only while someone is actually there to answer, and offer a ticket with a reference number the rest of the time. SpideyChat works this way by default: the Talk to a person button appears only while a team member has switched themselves on duty, and visitors can open a numbered support ticket at any hour. For a small team, the work is deciding when to be on duty and making the fallback clear.
Our guide on how to set up human handoff for your chatbot covers the setup in general. This post is about the availability part: when to offer a person, and what happens when nobody is around.
Why availability matters more than the button
A "talk to a human" button is a promise. If a visitor presses it and nothing happens, you have turned a mildly stuck customer into an annoyed one. They waited, nobody came, and they still do not have an answer.
Compare two visitors on a Sunday evening:
- One presses Talk to a person, sees "Finding someone to help", and waits ten minutes for nothing.
- The other is not offered a person. Instead, they open a ticket, get "Your issue is logged as ticket #1042", and receive a confirmation email.
The second visitor had no live conversation, but got a clear outcome and a reference. That is the case for offering a person only when one is available.
How availability works in SpideyChat
There are two switches, and both have to be on.
Per chatbot: in the chatbot's settings, tick Offer "Talk to a person". This allows the button for that bot.
Per person: in the Live inbox, each team member switches themselves on duty. Presence is per person, so one teammate going off duty does not sign out the rest. While at least one person on the account is on duty, chatbots with the option ticked show the button.
On-duty status lapses after 30 minutes unless you switch it on again. That is deliberate. People rarely remember to click "going offline" before lunch or a meeting, and a status that stays on all afternoon would offer visitors someone who is not there. The button is decided when the chat window loads, so a visitor who opened the chat a few minutes before your status lapsed may still see it.
What happens when a visitor asks for a person
When a visitor presses Talk to a person:
- The chat shows "Passing you to a teammate, one moment", then "Finding someone to help".
- The account owner gets an email naming the visitor if they gave a name, the chatbot, and their latest message, with a link to the inbox. You can turn this email off in settings.
- Anyone with the Live inbox open sees an alert, and a browser notification if they allowed them.
- The assistant keeps answering in the meantime, so the visitor is never left with silence.
When a team member joins, the visitor sees "[Name] joined the chat" and the assistant stops replying, so it cannot talk over the person. The name shown is taken from the first part of the team member's email address.
If the person who joined goes quiet, the system notices. With the conversation open, the inbox keeps the takeover alive. If five minutes pass without that, the next visitor message hands the conversation back to the assistant, which says "The team had to step away. I'll take it from here." When you finish, you can hand back yourself, and the visitor sees "You're back with the assistant."
The fallback when nobody is on duty
Outside your live hours, the Talk to a person button does not appear. Visitors still have two ways to reach you:
- The Report an issue button is always in the chat. It opens a short form for the issue, a name, an email or phone number, and up to three screenshots.
- Asking in their own words. If a visitor types something like "can I speak to someone", the bot offers to open a support ticket and shows the same form if they agree.
Either way, the ticket gets a number such as #1042, which the visitor sees in the chat. An email with the ticket number goes to the account owner, with replies going straight to the visitor's address, and a confirmation goes to the visitor. On Pro, tickets also land in a ticket inbox where you set status and priority and keep notes. The post on turning chat conversations into support tickets covers what makes a useful ticket.
Planning your on-duty hours
For a small team, a few habits make this work.
Only go on duty when you can reply within a minute or two. If you are on a call or with a customer, stay off. The ticket route serves visitors better than a slow live reply.
Choose blocks, not all day. Two or three predictable windows, such as 10am to 12pm and 2pm to 4pm, are easier to honour than "whenever I'm at my desk". Switch on at the start of each block, and switch on again every half hour while it lasts.
Keep the inbox open while on duty. Alerts appear there, and an open conversation keeps your takeover active.
Prepare canned replies. The Live inbox stores saved replies, so common answers such as your returns address or account steps take one click.
Share the rota. With teammates on the account, agree who is on duty when, so nobody assumes someone else has it.
Tell visitors when people are around
Visitors often ask "is anyone there?" or "when can I talk to someone?". Add your live hours to the bot's knowledge as a Q&A pair, for example: "Our team is on chat weekdays, 10am to 12pm and 2pm to 4pm UK time. Outside those hours, use Report an issue and we will reply by email the next working day." Then the bot can answer honestly at 9pm instead of implying someone might appear.
For more on setting expectations, read designing a human handoff your customers won't hate.
Turn it on for your chatbot
Tick Offer "Talk to a person" in your chatbot's settings, open the Live inbox, and switch yourself on duty during your next quiet hour to see the flow from both sides. The features page lists the live chat, ticket and inbox tools, and pricing shows which plan includes the ticket inbox.