case assignment not working salesforce

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Sunday, december 6, 2020, salesforce: case assignment rules not working.

• Case or Lead Assignment Rules fail to set the Owner
• Assignment rule does not fire on Cases created through Email-to-Case
• Why Salesforce assignment rule is not working?

Thanks for the info..It was helpful

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Email-to-case best practices: case assignment rules, queues & auto-replies.

By Stacy O’Leary

When you set up Email-to-case, you can take those emails and turn them automatically to Case records in Salesforce, send auto-replies, distribute them to your support team, and take other automated actions. These will save support teams a lot of energy creating Case records and managing them appropriately. Instead, you have the chance to free up the team’s time to focus on the Cases that really require intervention.

1. Who Can Use Email-to-case?

2. Set up Queues with a Catch-all Queue

3. Send Auto-replies with the Process Builder

• Subject does not contain Out of Office, OOO, out-of-office, vacation, PTO, paid time off, holiday
• Web Email does not contain @mycompanydomain

4. Add the Case Feed ID to the Case Email Templates

5. Sort Cases Based on Case, Contact, or Account Fields

Bonus Tip: Familiarize Yourself with the Support Settings

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How to Create Case Assignment Rules in Salesforce

Our organization uses Salesforce as its CRM tool, and the support team assigns cases manually. As a Salesforce Administrator, I was assigned the task of automating the case assignment for new cases. In Salesforce, we can automate this process using a case assignment rule.

In this tutorial, I will explain the case assignment rules in Salesforce and their limitations, and we will also discuss how to create a case assignment rule in Salesforce.

Table of Contents

Case Assignment Rule in Salesforce

In Salesforce, the case assignment rules help automate your organization’s support processes. The rules can also determine how cases are assigned to users or queues based on criteria that we define.

The case assignment rule can assign the cases when a new case is created. Then, that case can be created manually or automatically from web-to-case , email-to-case , etc.

How to Create a Case Assignment Rule in Salesforce

For example, there is a support team with several users, and we want to automatically assign a specific user to a new case when it is created and the Case Priority is High.

We can create a case assignment rule in Salesforce using the following steps.

1. Go to Setup . In the Quick Find Box , search for Assignment Rules . Then click on the Case Assignment Rule .

2. Then click on the New button to create a new rule.

3. Enter a  Rule Name . Then, activate the rule by clicking the  Activate  button. 

We can create only one active case assignment rule at a time. So, if you have any activated case assignment rule, it will get deactivated as you activate the new rule.

Then, click on the Save button.

4. Open the rule by clicking the Rule Name .

5. Then click on the New button to add rule entry criteria.

6. As you click the new button, you need to enter the following details:

• Sort Order: Here, you need to provide the number this entry should trigger.
• Criteria: As per our scenario, we need to enter Case Priority = High .
• Select User or Queue : Here, we need to assign high priority cases to specific user.
• Email Template : We can select an email template so that when a case is assigned to a user, they will receive an email regarding the same.

Then click on the Save button.

Proof of Concept:

7. Now, to check how the case assignment rule works, navigate to the case tab. Then, create a new case record with case priority as high and save the record.

8. As you save the record, you will see that the case owner has automatically changed to another user. That means a new user has been assigned to this case.

This is how we can create case assignment rules in Salesforce.

Limitations in Case Assignment Rule in Salesforce

The following are some limitations of the case assignment rule in Salesforce:

• The case assignment rule is only used when we want to assign records automatically to a user or queue. It cannot be used to update fields .
• If we change the criteria for an existing rule, the rule will not reassign cases until we manually update the case owner.
• In the rule entry criteria, we can only use case fields. It does not allow the use of the related fields of the case object.
• We can create only one active case assignment rule at a time.

You can also read the Case Assignment Rule in Salesforce .

I hope you got an idea about case assignment rules in Salesforce. In this article, we have seen what a case assignment rule is and its limitations. We have also seen how to create case assignment rule in Salesforce with an example and step-by-step explanation.

You may also like to read:

• Auto Response Rules in Salesforce
• Web-to-Case in Salesforce
• Email To Case Salesforce
• How to Create a Case Related to an Account using Flow in Salesforce

I am Bijay Kumar, the founder of SalesforceFAQs.com. Having over 10 years of experience working in salesforce technologies for clients across the world (Canada, Australia, United States, United Kingdom, New Zealand, etc.). I am a certified salesforce administrator and expert with experience in developing salesforce applications and projects. My goal is to make it easy for people to learn and use salesforce technologies by providing simple and easy-to-understand solutions. Check out the complete profile on About us .

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Case Assignment Rules not working for Custom Buttons

Wondering if anyone has had this issue and has a non-trigger based resolution. I am an admin, not a developer, and don't want to be implementing any Apex.

I am trying to automate the assignment of case teams for internal cases, my sales operations team and the sales engineering teams both use cases for requests.

For Sales Operations, case requests primarily come in through custom buttons that I have built on the relevant objects (Leads, Accounts, Opportunities, and CPQ Quotes). This allows for the subject of the cases to be consistent, which helps my team. However, this process seems to prevent the assignment box from being checked, and therefore the record does not flow through the assignment process.

This isn't an issue for actual record assignment, I am using a workflow for that, but instead for the assignment of case teams to allow for proper record sharing.

This is primarily an issue because we have fairly strict sharing rules for our sales team. They can only view cases that are on accounts they own, but I want them to also be able to view requests that they submitted either on accounts they don't own (at least until that ownership is resolved), or on leads, without giving them access to all cases.

Any help is appreciated!

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How to Create Salesforce Assignment Rules: a Step-by-Step Guide

Salesforce is a strong and even irreplaceable tool when it comes to modern customer relationship management, customer service, and sales. Since it has an array of functionalities, one might feel overwhelmed by them. No worries!

Today we’d like to highlight one of the most important features for your marketing and service activities: Salesforce Case Assignment Rules and Salesforce Lead Assignment Rules. What is the difference between them? Keep reading.

Assignment Rules in Salesforce Explained

First things first, assignment rules are a great instrument to better organize your sales and support teams’ work. It’s also a perfect tool for improving your lead generation. As you already know, there are two types of assignment rules in Salesforce: Lead Assignment Rules and Case Assignment Rules. By using them, you can automate the process of assigning appropriate users or queues to Leads and Cases. 

To better understand the Salesforce terminology, we’ll give you a short definition of what is a Lead and what is a Case in Salesforce:

• Lead  – this is a prospect, meaning that this is someone who is interested in your product or service, but not yet ready to buy.
• Case  – this is literally a customer’s question, complaint, or suggestion about your product or service.

How to locate Salesforce Lead Assignment Rules and Case Assignment Rules? Easy. First, go to the Setup tab in your organization. Start typing Assignment rules in the Quick Find box and there you are: you can view assignment rules under Marketing (Salesforce Lead Assignment Rules) and Service (Case Assignment Rules) tabs.

With assignment rules, you can automatically deliver specific Cases to the right people in the team or departments who are specialized in a certain area (aka subject-matter experts), so that the customers receive timely and qualified responses. A Case Assignment Rule can assign cases without the connection to the case creation source. The thing is that a case can be submitted through a customer portal, a self-service portal, or by email, to name just a few options.

Plus, assignment rules in Salesforce also enable you to sort cases by priority according to the customer’s support package (Platinum, Silver, etc.).

The same thing applies to Lead Assignment Rules in Salesforce. By leveraging lead assignment criteria, you can specify how leads will be assigned to users or queues. They can do that regardless of whether leads are created manually or imported with the Data Import Wizard.

Salesforce Classic vs Lightning Experience: Establishing the Key Differences

Assignment Rules Limitation

You can’t build as many assignment rules as you see fit. There are certain limitations in Salesforce. For instance, there are limits for the number of rules, entries, and actions allowed by the rule.

Thus, there can be up to 2,000 total rules across objects (applies to any combination of workflow, assignment, auto-response, and escalation rules, active or inactive), 50 actives rules per object (applies to any combination of active workflow, assignment, auto-response, and escalation rules, as well as record change processes), 3,000 entries per rule, and 300 formula criteria entries per rule.

Besides, there is a limitation on actions when creating assignment rules in Salesforce – up to 200 actions allowed per rule. As for filter criteria, you can specify up to 25 per rule entry.

Creating Assignment Rules in Salesforce

Now that you know what assignment rules are for, we’ll show you how to set them up. After reading this paragraph, you’ll understand how to create a Case Queue, Case Assignment Rules, and Lead Assignment Rules in Salesforce. Spoiler alert: this is no sweat!

1. Case Queue in Salesforce Creation

What is a queue? It allows groups of users to manage a shared workload more effectively. A queue is basically a location where records can be transferred for processing by a group member.

Now, let’s get the ball rolling.

• Navigate Setup in your Salesforce organization. Type “Queue” in the Quick Find box and then enter its Name and Label. 

• Leave the Queue Email field empty if you want the support employees included in the queue to receive emails when new cases are created or type the email addresses of the people who will receive this kind of notification.
• Choose Case and add it to the Selected Objects column.

• Choose members and add them to the Selected Members column. After everything is done, click Save.

2. Case Assignment Rule Creation

• To create one Case Assignment Rule, acess Setup in your Salesforce organization. Type Assignment Rules in the Quick Find box and choose Case Assignment Rules. After that, click the New button and enter the Rule Name. Once you’re done, hit Save. Make sure you tick the Activate field to make your new assignment rule legitimate. Remember that this action will deactivate any other current Case Assignment Rule.

• Click on the rule you just created. In the Rule Entries section, click the New button.

• This is when all the magic starts. The Sort Order section defines the order in which entries will be processed. If you enter “1”, it means that this entry will be processed first.
• Select the criteria for this rule entry. Here, you have several options: to run this rule if the criteria are met or if formula evaluates to true. In our case, I selected the criteria. This pretty much a standard Case Assignment Rule with such criteria as Case Number, Case Origin, and Case Reason.

• After that, you can choose the User or a queue this rule entry will be assigned to. I will select a User.
• Choose the Email Template this user will receive when the new case will be assigned to him. After that, hit the Save button.

• Do not omit the testing phase – you need to clearly understand if everything is working correctly or you need to change assignment rules.

3. Lead Assignment Rule Creation

• With Salesforce Lead Assignment Rules, the process is pretty much the same. Navigate to Setup in your Salesforce organization. As previously done, start typing Assignment Rules in the Quick Find box and select Lead Assignment Rules. Click the New button.
• Specify the lead assignment rule name and do not forget to check the Activate box.
• In the Rule Entries section, choose New. Here, you specify the order in which the rule entry will appear and define the criteria for the given rule entry. For this lead assignment, I will specify such criteria as Lead:City equals New York, Lead:Email contains examplecompany, and Lead: Lead Status equals Open – Not Contacted.

• Next, we need to select a User or a queue for this lead assignment. Let it be Olesia Melnichenko.
• After that, we also choose an email template and click Save.

Tips and Tricks for Creating Assignment Rules in Salesforce

• Test your assignment rule in a sandbox before running it on your production org. This way, you can prevent yourself from glitches and inaccurate data.
• Leverage custom formula fields to simplify complex assignment rules. This might be the case if you need to enlist the states by regions.
• Set up round robin assignment rules for avoiding bottlenecks in your work routine. It means that the system will allocate each new case or lead to a different user or a queue until everyone has been assigned the same amount and the process repeats.
• Consider a final rule entry with no criteria. This way, you can gather everything that didn’t match the criteria you define and assign it to a user or a queue.

Bottom Line

Hopefully, we managed to unscramble the assignment rules in Salesforce for you. They are the best for streamlining your business operations. Just imagine how sleek and error-free your work can be! Newly created leads and cases are assigned to an appropriate team member or queue, no chaos.

That is why you shouldn’t miss the benefits you can get from using assignment rules. Give them a try on your organization! In case you have any troubles, ask the Advanced Communities team . We can help you with everything from the Salesforce integration and configuration or further technical maintenance.

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How to Apply Case Assignment Rules in Flow

May 18, 2023 Yumi Ibrahimzade Actions , Automation , Flow , Flow Actions , Flow Packages , Packages 29

The case object is a core part of the Salesforce platform. It helps manage and track customer issues and inquiries. You can use this standard object to handle support requests effectively. The case object acts as a central repository for recording and monitoring customer interactions. It allows you to streamline your customer service processes. In order to improve the support efficiency, it is important to assign cases to the right teams or individuals. Although you can manually assign the record, it is possible to use the standard case assignment rules as well. Case assignment rules determine how cases are assigned to users or put into queues.

When you create a new case record, you can just mark "Assign using active assignment rule" to run case assignment rules.

However, if you are creating the case record using Salesforce Flow, there is no standard option to run the case assignment rules. This option exists just for lead assignment rules. Moreover, when you create a case using flow, you have to set the correct owner id. Otherwise, the system doesn't run the case assignment rules and assigns the case to the current user. If you really want to use the logic that you have in your assignment rule, you will have to build the same logic again in the flow.

In this post, you can find a custom invocable action (Apex class) that runs case assignment rules for any case record that you want.

How to Use the Action

1-  Install the action using the installation links below.

2-  Add a new action to your flow and search for "Apply Case Assignment Rules", this is the name of the action that you installed.

3- Give a name to the action and provide the id of the case record that you want to assign.

You can use this action in any flow type that supports the action element.

Here is a screen flow that clones a case record with its related records. It uses this custom action to assign the new case record. Read this post to learn how to create a flow to clone a record with its related records.

Installation Links

Use this link to install in production or developer edition environments.

Use this link to install in sandbox environments.

28 Comments

Is that a future method or synchronous?

It is synchronous.

Hi Yumi, I tried using this on a case after save flow as an immediate action on create and it doesn't work. However, if I add a scheduled path of 0 min after creation, it works. Do you know of this limitation? Thanks!

I'm also noticing that this doesn't work when a guest executes a screen flow from a public page which creates the case.

Is your screen flow working in system context - view all data?

Hi Jay, It works in asynchronous path as well. I will check if it is possible to use it in the immediate path.

Thank you, I don't have to code this now.

You are welcome!

Hey Yumi, Case is assigned but email is not fired to members of queue? Any suggestions?

Hi Priyanshu, You are right. I just added it to the code and uploaded the package again. Can you please try with the new version?

Thanks Yumi, Can you please provide the url for new version?

Yumi, waiting for your response.

Is there a way to verify (in a flow decision), using a formula or some other way, if the "Assign using active assignment rule" is checked? I have a user case where the Assignment rules need to be triggered within the flow ONLY when the checkbox "Assign using active assignment rule" is checked, but I cannot find a way to do so. Any ideas?

"Assign using active assignment rule" is not a field on the object, so I think unfortunately it is not possible to get this information.

Hey Yumi Ibrahimzade, Not working in production or can you please provide url for update version? Thanks in advance 🙂

Thank you so much for this package. I just came across the need for this and then found your solution. It works exactly as expected.

I am glad that you found it useful!

Thanks Yumi, It helped me a lot to resolve my issue!

I am glad that you liked it Nadia!

Thanks for the post, Yumi, would you be willing to publish the code in a code snippet?

You are welcome Andy. Here is the code:

public class ApplyCaseAssignmentRules { @InvocableMethod (label='Apply Case Assignment Rules') public static void CaseAssign(List CaseId) { Database.DMLOptions dmo = new Database.DMLOptions(); dmo.assignmentRuleHeader.useDefaultRule= true; dmo.EmailHeader.TriggerUserEmail = true; Case Cases=[Select id From Case Where Case.id in:CaseId]; Cases.setOptions(dmo); update Cases; } }

I am using this action in a trigger flow (After Save), but it's not working, I should a scheduled path if I wanted to work, any suggestions please ? Thank you

Hi, You should use this action in a scheduled or asynchronous path.

I am trying to install in sandbox and getting this error: ApplyCaseAssignmentRulesTest: Method does not exist or incorrect signature: void startTest() from the type Test

Worked perfect in a screen flow with no Scheduled or Asynchronous path.. Thanks!

Hi Yumi! We have installed the packaged and worked perfectly well in a flow that creates cases. Thank you so much for this. We are facing another situation: we have a flow that reopens a case and we need to go through assigment rules again only when the case user owner is not active. We added the apex code to the flow but it didn´t work in this scenario. Does it trigger only for new cases? Is it possible to use it for updated cases? Can you help? Thank you in advanced.

It works on update too, can you try to run this action in async path?

Hi, I've used the component in Screenflow without any issue, but now I'm getting this one : "The "ApplyCaseAssignmentRules" element in your flow has validation errors." Is there a way to know more about the error ? It works in my previous flow version and the output, Case record variable as Id, is the same in both version. With further tests, I've noticed that the flow needed to be activated in order for the Apex Class to work.

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• Salesforce Case Management – Best Practices from A Service Cloud Consultant

Urgency is the name of the game when it comes to Salesforce case management in Service Cloud . Regardless of your role, industry, or how your team uses Salesforce cases, the initial response time to customers’ problems is the most crucial factor at play. Hence the need for case teams to demonstrate attention to detail and immediate understanding of the problem, or else escalate unanswered question to the right agent, case owner, or case team quickly.

After all, from the perspective of a support manager, case management is just like any other obstacle we face that depends on the response of another person: it’s all about managing expectations quickly and accurately.

But you don’t have to take our word for it, our team sat down with Tiffany Joseph, a seasoned Salesforce Service Cloud consultant at Uptima with over a decade of experience in case management.

In this article you’ll find tips and advice on Salesforce Case Management best practices from this 6x certified Salesforce consultant’s perspective.

“When you’re talking about sales, you’re always trying to make the sales cycle shorter. It’s the same way with Service Cloud, because when you’re focused on case management, when you’re dealing with customer issues, you’re always trying to make sure your response happens in the shortest period of time.” – Tiffany Joseph, Senior Salesforce Consultant | 6x Salesforce Certified

Table of contents

Service channels start and end with the service console, which salesforce modules are meant for case management, 4 key considerations for successful salesforce case management, 5 best practices for optimizing your salesforce case management system, service cloud screen flows, action plans and macros, automation and analytics for your case management system.

• After automation, what’s next?

Ready to integrate your service workflows with the rest of your stack?

Case management faq.

Any Salesforce case management system depends on having a solid foundation: a customer portal, assignment rules, escalation rules, a centralized platform to manage cases and so on.

Without an optimized interface and dashboard for your support agents, it can be challenging to follow case status, case ownership, or prioritize based on case scoring.

This is where a Salesforce consultant like Tiffany excels: helping businesses launch their own Salesforce Service Cloud implementation with the right tools for the job.

What is a Salesforce case?

A Salesforce case object is used to represent any ticket submitted through a customer portal or via web form that represents a problem facing customers or clients, as well as internal teams and departments. The object type is generally housed in Salesforce Service Cloud where each case record is then shared with the appropriate case team. Often (though not always) cases are created via email-to-case settings in Salesforce.

How are Salesforce cases typically used?

• IT departments might run a Salesforce case management system for equipment requests, vetting software purchases, etc. Perhaps they would be sent a notification email when an internal team submits a ticket or they’d have automated rules to filter out the same case, a closed case, or prevent them from reopening cases that had already been resolved.
• Customers might email support who would then have access to a complete view of that customer in Salesforce in order to best respond to the issue. The case might include related records, a previous solution provided, relevant details etc.
• Visitors to your website might submit questions or queries about your product that can be tracked as cases. In this case (pun intended), the case object might have less information and urgency than the previous two examples, so it would likely be a lower priority for case teams.

According to Tiffany, Salesforce case management helps the most when the object is used a ticketing system, and not for any other use case.

“A lot of companies take the case objects and they use it for something else. But this is a core functionality of Service Cloud. Don’t use it outside of what it was intended for. You can customize virtually anything in Salesforce, but this is one of the things that you want to treat as sacred.” Tiffany Joseph, Senior Salesforce Consultant | 6x Salesforce Certified

Successful case management depends on your team being able to assign cases to the appropriate agents, prioritizing them quickly, and ensuring consistent follow-up and resolution.

Whether you’re a medium-sized business or a larger enterprise organization with a Salesforce implementation, there are a suite of cloud-based applications that can be tailored to support cases fairly readily.

Salesforce Service Cloud

Service Cloud is the flagship support tool for Salesforce users. It’s designed with tools ready to support case management, knowledge management, cross-channel communication, self-service portals, and field service management. At its core, the product enables businesses to track customer interactions, automate workflows, and measure KPIs.

Salesforce Field Service

Field Service is a Service Cloud add-on for businesses with technicians and teams who operate on-site or on-location. It provides tools for scheduling, dispatching, work order management, asset tracking, inventory management, and mobile workforce enablement.

Customer Service Incident Management

For ITSM use cases, there’s Salesforce’s Customer Service Incident Management (CSIM) module for Service Cloud. It’s designed to help teams handle incident identification, tracking, communication, and resolution. CSIM helps provide businesses with a unified workspace for managing incidents and cases related to customer data.

Case management in Salesforce isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution. Two businesses can implement the same Salesforce products and still use them in completely different ways for completely different ends. Here are some of the key considerations of a successful case management process:

Prioritize quick resolution times

Quick resolution times are critical to maintaining high levels of customer satisfaction. Consider applying automation (or a Salesforce integration ) to your workflow to speed up case prioritization (through scoring, for example).

Setting the right expectations for customers (without unwanted surprises) goes a long way towards ensuring a positive experience for everyone. So if a customer sends a ticket, your team should respond promptly and be upfront about when and how their issue will be resolved.

Manage the case lifecycle carefully

Effective case management requires assigning cases to the appropriate agents, prioritizing them based on urgency, and ensuring consistent follow-up and resolution. Be sure your team leads understand the lifecycle of the average case inside out. Don’t hesitate to enroll your colleagues in a few Trailhead courses or watching Salesforce webinars to learn the basics from experienced pros.

Here’s a great example on setting escalation rules for product support :

Establish a case management process

Salesforce case management is the backbone of an effective customer service strategy that starts with understanding the case lifecycle. But, you can’t manage those cases without the right processes in place. In other words, a tool is only as good as the hands holding it. So, once you’ve chosen your selection of modules, apps and tools, begun to learn the basics, and better understand how to triage cases, it’s time to establish a clear process for case management.

Plan out a clear process for your organization to best serve customers with careful attention to how you create case, response time, and time to a closed case.

Here’s a Trailhead course on creating a process for managing cases .

Keep your customers happy!

Throughout Tiffany’s career, she’s been adamant about the fact that if your company uses Service Cloud, then you likely understand the importance of keeping customers happy. Or, as she puts it:

“You put a lot of effort into acquiring your customers, but your efforts don’t stop there. Maintaining and supporting that relationship is key. It’s fundamental to your business’s success, today more than ever. Word of mouth and referrals sell, especially in B2B if your product starts at a higher price point. A happy customer is a happy champion for your brand.” Tiffany Joseph, Senior Salesforce Consultant | 6x Salesforce Certified

Respect the core functionality

As mentioned above, if you’re using case objects from the Salesforce platform, use them as intended. Cases are best used to represent tickets, customer complaints, customer inquiries and as a pre-req for a work orders. If you’re planning on using cases for something else, stop and add a new custom object instead.

Empower internal teams with the tools they already use

The Salesforce platform is highly versatile and full of functionality that not even the experts always know about. We asked Tiffany which out-of-the-box functions or features in Service Cloud are most often overlooked:

“There are a lot of tools that aren’t admin configurable that users never look at: macros, action plans, just the regular actions available on the page. There are so many ways users can increase their productivity. Automation tools, for example, can be used without an admin and that often gets overlooked. Consultants tend to ignore those functions because they never use them – their focus is always on launching the product and setting up functions that require configuration.” Tiffany Joseph, Senior Salesforce Consultant | 6x Salesforce Certified

Don’t shy away from data and reporting

The best way to improve performance over time is by looking back for trends, especially from your best case teams. Or as Tiffany says: “You can get so many insights from your reporting, especially by paying attention to your high performers. What are they doing to be a high performer? Look at their behaviour and actions. Leverage that and use it to support and raise up the entire team. Turn your best people into leaders!”

Here’s an example of a Service Cloud KPI dashboard :

Listen to your support team

Another issue Tiffany has experienced first-hand is the lack of two-way communication. Support teams are overloaded with tickets, and it can feel as though there’s no time to stop and reflect on how to work better with a focus only on getting work done.

“I’m going to say something controversial here. Most call center teams or case management teams, particularly small businesses are led by women in middle management positions who leadership doesn’t listen to. Compound that with service teams getting smaller budgets than sales and it’s no wonder they’re overloaded. It’s a less flashy job that doesn’t get as much credit as the sales team, but they support the business financially almost as much. Pay attention to the woman in the room because she always knows what’s up.” Tiffany Joseph, Senior Salesforce Consultant | 6x Salesforce Certified

Maintain clear communication channels between L1 and L2 teams

Tiffany further highlighted the need for open channels of communication between the teams receiving tickets and the teams resolving them. So do your best to mitigate tension between teams, reduce toxicity where you can, and encourage a team-first attitude.

“So let’s imagine a case is created and then probably triaged by an L-1 team to review and assess. Once the work order goes ahead, they start scheduling someone to go on site or address the ticket virtually. That’s a tier two team. They’re highly specialized, better trained; it could be an escalation team or a team with more experience. Source: Salesforce So L-1 is the go-between for the customer and L-2. They send information back and forth, or the customer is just escalated to the second tier. It depends on how the org is set up. But that dynamic is so important. It needs to be flawless to work properly.” Tiffany Joseph, Senior Salesforce Consultant | 6x Salesforce Certified

Salesforce case management helps with centralizing customer interactions (keeping everything in one place) so that nothing gets missed. It’s also useful to simplify the support process for internal case teams. Setting up a few automated rules or incorporating macros and action plans makes collaboration easier, and delivers results to customers faster.

Screen Flows

Screen flows let your agents triage customers faster with a simplified intake process that asks the right questions upfront. Here’s a more in-depth explanation of Screen Flows and how to use them from Salesforce admin evangelist, Jennifer Lee.

In short, service agents’ screen flows both collect data and can be used to display data to customers. It’s all about helping the support team or technical support agent to deliver consistent and high-quality service.

Salesforce macros work like shortcuts for the support team to get through single-click tasks faster. Agents can use them to send emails from a template, update cases, perform repetitive tasks and a lot more. This saves valuable time, eliminates manual errors, and ensures a consistent approach to customer interactions.

Here’s a guide to setting up macros in Service Cloud.

Action plans

Action plans allow you to create templates for common processes. That might include onboarding a new client or handling an application of some kind. An action plan would then allow you to automate those sequences. After that, it’s easy to assign tasks, sets deadlines, approve budget requests, etc. You can even set up reports quickly to monitor real-time progress.

Here’s more info about action plans.

Action plans are like templates that users can create to automate sequences of tasks, think: follow-up calls, cadences in both case management and sales scenarios, and so on. They’re extremely useful. Tiffany Joseph, Senior Salesforce Consultant | 6x Salesforce Certified

What’s the difference between a macro and an action plan?

Action plan:.

• Focus: Automating multi-step processes and workflows.
• Functionality: Creates a series of tasks or actions in a specific order, often with assigned owners and due dates.
• Use Cases: Onboarding new clients, handling applications, or any process involving multiple steps and collaboration.
• Benefits: Simplifies complex processes, ensures accountability, and provides visibility into progress.
• Focus: Automating repetitive, single-click actions.
• Functionality: Executes a predefined set of instructions, such as sending an email, updating a field, or logging a call.
• Use Cases: Responding to common inquiries, updating case statuses, performing data entry tasks.
• Benefits: Saves time on redundant tasks, reduces human error, ensures consistency, and improves agent productivity.

Process Builder and Auto Response Rules

Salesforce’s Process Builder and auto-response rules are essential for automating the case management process in Salesforce. Process Builder allows users to create complex automation without code, making it easier to trigger actions based on specific criteria.

Auto-response rules can automatically acknowledge customer inquiries, enhancing communication and setting clear expectations for resolution.

Monitoring case escalation

Setting up an automation to help monitor case escalation is critical for gaining immediate insights into support operations. Tracking interaction times and analyzing performance metrics helps companies identify areas for improvement and enhance case management strategies.

Salesforce’s reporting tools enable businesses to monitor key metrics like average handle time and customer satisfaction. This helps teams make data-driven decisions to improve customer support. Here’s how to set up a rule to monitor case escalation in Service Cloud .

Salesforce is extremely customizable. It’s like a big toolbox with many different tools to achieve the same goal. And you really want to make sure that you’re using the right tool at the right time, so that you’re efficient and you can scale… And you’re not causing problems for your team down the road. Tiffany Joseph, Senior Salesforce Consultant | 6x Salesforce Certified

After automation, what’s next?

Your business can significantly improve its customer support operations with a few simple strategies:

• Understand the case management process.
• Leverage various case creation methods.
• Manage the case lifecycle efficiently.
• Enhance agent productivity through tools like the Lightning Service Console and automation.

Embrace these strategies to transform your customer service and build stronger, more loyal customer relationships. And of course, here are some final thoughts from Tiffany for teams working in Service Cloud:

When you’re talking about sales, you’re talking about forecasting, hitting sales goals or targets, tracking regions and products… But when it comes to Service Cloud, you’re looking at a story that comes after all of that. You need to be able to support the product your team just sold. How do you do that? By supporting the people serving your customer’s needs. Your sales team is there to bring in new customers, the support team is there to help you keep them. Tiffany Joseph, Senior Salesforce Consultant | 6x Salesforce Certified

Salesforce Service Cloud is a powerful tool in its own right with unique strengths and weaknesses. But once you’ve completed your implementation, what happens if you need to expand your tool stack? The cost of third party consulting services is often more than the IT department’s budget can afford.

Luckily, there are secure alternatives to syncing Salesforce objects and records with other tools – or even other Salesforce objects.

Unito is a 2-way integration platform that turns any standard or custom Salesforce object into items in 50+ leading apps. That includes tasks, tickets, issues, calendar events, contacts, records, spreadsheet rows, and other Salesforce objects.

Best of all? It’s no-code, yet fully configurable so anyone on your team can create a flow in minutes flat. That means you don’t have to be an engineer or understand script (although it helps!) to start integrating immediately. Here’s our documentation for Salesforce integrations .

Ready to sync Service Cloud with the rest of your stack?

Talk to an integration expert

What is a case in Salesforce?

A case in Salesforce is essentially a record that helps you manage and track customer issues or inquiries, giving you a clear overview of all interactions. It’s a vital tool for providing excellent customer support.

How does Email-to-Case work in Salesforce?

Email-to-Case in Salesforce simplifies your workflow by automatically turning incoming emails from customers into case records, allowing for quicker responses and better management of customer issues.

What are the key features of Salesforce case management?

Salesforce case management runs at its best when your organization makes use of automation and categorization. Tools like the Service Console and Process Builder further enhance your team’s responsiveness.

How can businesses prioritize cases in Salesforce?

To effectively prioritize cases in Salesforce, implement scoring systems, use flags, and set up automation rules. These are simple, yet well-practiced processes among service teams to put the most important tickets up front.

Why is merging duplicate cases important in Salesforce?

Merging duplicate cases is crucial because it maintains data integrity and prevents confusion, ensuring that your support team doesn’t mistakenly reach out to the same customer multiple times.

How can I improve my customer service strategy?

Even though each Salesforce organization’s use cases will be slightly different, there are clear similarities across any case lifecycle: the customer or user sends a ticket, the support team receives customer activity alerts, your tools collect cases, support emails provide options for self-service, support managers or automated workflows assign cases with relevant information to each agent or other departments, agents then resolve cases, etc.

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Case Assignment Rule not working from Trigger

Has anyone faced the below issue with Assignment rules?

We run the case assignment rules from the trigger when certain conditions are met. It works perfectly fine.

But in the below scenario it doesn't work Case Update > Custom Object Update > Case Update

So it's not working when the Case is updated through automation.

Any Idea on this.

• assignment-rules

If you use Process Builder, Flows, or Workflow Rules to perform updates, the Assignment Rule won't run a second time, as noted in Triggers and Order of Execution . If you use a trigger to perform related updates, note that even after triggers run before assignment rules, so the earlier, original assignment rule ends up "winning" in that scenario. If you use triggers to update related records, make sure you're using DMLOptions with the assignmentRuleHeader set correctly.

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