Chats (Basic): View, print, archive, delete

TaxDome gives you many tools to manage and keep track of your clients messages. You can view all replies at once or just from one client. You can also archive your chats, reopen and delete them, find out when a client received a message, and more.

Reply to client messages

Team members receive an email and a notification in their Inbox+ whenever one of their assigned clients creates a new chat thread, replies to a chat, or changes a task. 

Whenever someone replies to a thread, the Inbox+ notification is updated; only one notification per chat thread is displayed. When there’s a new message in a thread, the notification is updated and moves to the top. (Here's more on notifications.)

To view the most recent message and respond to it, click on the name of the thread or the Go to... link.

Note: Change your notification preferences whenever you need to.

View and reply to a client’s chat by going to the  Communication tab in their account. In that tab, everything happens in real-time, as with DMs. Click on a thread to view it.

Inside chat threads, you can:

• Write messages in the input field.
• Send a message by pressing Ctrl + Enter on Windows or Cmd + Enter on Mac.
• View and download client-uploaded files.
• Add, view, download and delete firm-uploaded files.
• Create client requests and link the existing ones to chat threads.
• Quote messages using the Reply option. You can quote both clients and your own messages.
• Add, review and check off client tasks.

When you receive a response from a client whose account includes other users— two or more contacts who have Login toggled on—you’ll always know who is responding inside the chat thread, since the contact's name is shown as the author.

View all client account chats 

To view all chat threads for a client account, go to Clients, select the account, then open the Communication tab. The circle displayed to the right of the Communication tab shows how many unread chats and SMS messages an account has. The green dot at the Chats tab shows unread threads under it.

The Chats page lists all the chats for the client account and sorts them chronologically by the most recent response. There’s also a page for SMS communication .

This is what you have inside the Chats page:

1. Unread and Read sections. Threads with unread messages are located at the top. A thread is read if at least one firm member reads all the messages inside. Once you have read all the messages, section names disappear. 
2. Status and author. Threads with unread messages are marked with a green paper plane icon and a dot, while read threads are marked with a purple paper plane icon and archived ones are marked with a grey one. You can also see the name of the person who sent the latest message in a thread.
3. Subject and response time. This displays the content of the latest message and the date/time sent, whether attached documents are present, and whether client tasks are in a thread.
4. Client tasks status. This shows how many tasks in the thread have been completed from the total number of tasks. The number of incomplete tasks is highlighted in blue, and those completed are highlighted in grey.
5. Filter. Filter chat threads by time interval, client tasks completion or thread status (see below).

Filter chat threads

You can filter your chat threads for a client account by showing only the ones that are relevant. For example, filtering might allow you to quickly find all threads with incompleted client tasks or the ones that have been archived. There are three ways to filter:

• Time interval: see chat threads with responses or client tasks created during a specific time interval.
• Client tasks: see chat threads with Incomplete or Completed client tasks, or select All to see threads with client tasks only.
• Status: see chat threads with the Active or Archived status only.

To filter a list, click  Filter in the top-right corner, select the filters you want, then click Apply. You can apply as few or as many filters as needed. 

Once you’ve applied your selected filters, the list is narrowed accordingly. The selected filters are shown at the top of the  Filter sidebar. You can easily change the filters by adding or deleting any of them; otherwise, click Reset to clear all of them to start fresh. Here's more on applying filters.

Link chat threads to jobs

Linking chat threads to jobs lets you easily access connected conversations from pipelines and quickly review details, client requests and to-dos. 

To link a new job, go to the  Linked jobs tab of a thread and click Link to job, select one or more jobs by clicking checkboxes on the left, and then click Save. Use the search field to find a certain job or click the up-down arrows to sort jobs by their name or pipelines.

All linked jobs are displayed in the  Linked jobs tab. Click X to the right of the job name to unlink it, or click the job name to view its details on a new page.

Send/link client requests

Chats allow you to send client requests right from threads. This way, whenever you understand you need additional information or documents, you can request them right from the chat thread.

• To create a new request and link it to the chat thread:

1. Click Client request.
2. Select New client request.
3. Follow the steps required to create a new client request.

• To link an existing request or requests sent to the client:

1. Click Client request.
2. Select Select from existing.
3. Select checkboxes next to all client requests you need and click Send.

Your clients will see the request preview (its name and icon) and a direct link to it:

Edit your messages

Team members can edit messages they sent in the last 24 hours. So, if you need to make changes in a message:

1. Open a chat thread.

2. Click the three dots to the right of the message, then select Edit.

3. Make edits you need in the text field, then press ✔ to keep changes or X to discard them. The editing time will be displayed next to the message, and your clients will be able to see it.

Note! Editing messages is not available to your clients. Also, you can't edit messages sent by others.

Delete your messages

Only a firm owner and an admin can delete their own messages. To do so:

1. Open a chat thread.

2. Click the three dots to the right of the message, then select Delete

Note! Deleting a message with documents attached will also remove these documents from the Documents tab of the chat thread.

See which messages have been received and read

Gray or green checkmarks appear next to each message you or any of the team members sent. All team members always see if the message from the firm was read by a client, disregarding who sent it.

Here’s what the checkmarks mean:

The message was successfully sent.

The client has read the message. If there are several users linked to the client account, green checkmarks indicate that at least one has read the message.

As for the client, they don't see if you have read their messages. Therefore, you don't need to feel pressured to respond immediately, lest they think you're ignoring them. 

Filter your account list to see which clients have open questions or unread messages:

1. Go to Clients, then click Filter.

2. Select Chats in the dropdown, check the option you prefer:

• Active: all accounts with active chat threads.
• Unread: all accounts with unread chat threads.
• Archived: all accounts with archived chat threads.

Print chats

To print a chat thread, click the three dots in the upper far right of the chat window, then select Print from the drop-down.

Archive and reopen chat threads

Once you receive all the information you need from a client in a chat thread, archive or delete it to avoid clutter. When you archive a chat thread, you still have access to it. However, if it still has incomplete tasks, clients won’t be able to view them on their dashboard.

To archive chat threads, click the three dots to the upper far right, click Archive, then click Yes in the Archive chat pop-up.

By default, chat threads are filtered by the Active status. To switch between chats displayed, apply filtering by the chat status. To display both active and archived chats, reset filters. 

If you archive a chat thread but later discover you need it, reopen it.

1. Go to the Chats page of the Communication tab for the client account.
2. Click the Filter button on the far right of the page, select Archive from the Status section and click Apply.
3. Open the chat thread, click the three dots to the far right of the chat, then click Reopen.

Archived chats automatically become active when the following actions are performed in the thread (either by firm or a client):

• Sending a new message
• Sending, resending or editing client tasks
• Adding a new or existing client request
• Uploading documents

Mark chat threads unread

You can move a chat thread back to the unread section so that it is displayed at the top of the list. To mark a chat thread unread, click the three dots to the far right of the chat thread and select Mark as unread.

Delete chat threads

Unlike archived message threads, deleted ones cannot be restored. 

The firm owner and an admin can delete any chat threads, while team members can only delete the threads they've created. To permanently remove a chat thread:

1. Click the three dots to the far right of the chat thread, then click Delete.

2. Click Delete in the Delete chat pop-up.