Chats (Basic): View, Print, Archive, Delete

TaxDome gives you lots of 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.

Covered here:

• Responding to client messages
• Seeing all chats for a client account
• Filtering chat threads
• Linking chat threads to jobs
• Editing your messages
• Deleting your messages
• Seeing which messages have been received and read
• Printing chats
• Archiving and reopening chat threads
• Deleting chat threads

Responding 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 makes changes to 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:

• Communicate with clients by typing in the chat field
• Send a message by hitting ctrl + enter on Windows or cmd + enter on a Mac
• View and download client-uploaded files
• Add, view, download and delete firm-uploaded files
• 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.

Seeing all chats for a client account

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.

All the chats for the client account are sorted chronologically by the most recent response on the Chats page. There’s also a page for communication via SMS.

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 read 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. Displays content of the latest message and the date/time sent, if there are docs attached, and if there are client tasks in a thread.
4. Client tasks status. Shows how many tasks in the thread are completed out of the total number of tasks. The number of incomplete tasks are highlighted in blue and those completed in grey.
5. Filter. Filter chat threads by time interval, client tasks completion or thread status (see below).

Filtering 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 page. 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.)

Linking chat threads to jobs

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.

Editing your messages

A firm owner and an employee 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.

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

Deleting 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.

Seeing 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 see checkmarks only for the messages sent by them. If someone from the firm has seen their message it is shown as read. The client doesn't see the statuses of the firm's messages. 

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.

Printing 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.

Archiving and reopening 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.

Archived chat threads are listed on the Chats page together with active threads. They stay visible for clients and are marked with a grey paper plane icon and the Archived label at the top of the thread. However, you can filter your page so that archived threads are not displayed.

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
• Uploading documents

Deleting chat threads

Unlike archived message threads, deleted ones cannot be restored. To permanently remove a chat thread:

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

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