Overview
Pilot provides a way to centralize your inbound customer requests into one place - Inbox.
You can think of customer support as a pipeline.
The requests come from various channels. These are sources, from which requests can come in.
Right now, Pilot LMS supports two channels: emails and customer portal messenger. You can manually log emails, calls, SMS, WhatsApp, or "Other".
Pilot team is working on adding additional channels, like calls and SMS/WhatsApp.
After a request is in the main Inbox (regardless of where it came from), it becomes a Conversation.
Conversations can be triaged to different teams using inboxes. An inbox is a conceptual groping of requests based on your own criteria. For example, you can have inboxes based on the type of the request (e.g., "Cases", "Billing", "Shipping"), based on which team is responsible for handling this conversation (e.g., "Front Office", "CAD", "CAM"), or anything that makes sense for you.
When a conversation is resolved, you can "Close" it.
Views
When you open the Inbox page, you'll see a sidebar on the left with several built-in views:
Your Inbox shows all open conversations that are assigned to you. This is your personal work queue — the conversations you're responsible for handling.
Mentions shows conversations where someone has tagged you in a comment. This is useful for staying in the loop on conversations that need your input even if they're not assigned to you.
All shows every conversation across all inboxes, both open and closed. Use this view when you need to search for a specific conversation or get a broad overview of all activity.
Unassigned shows open conversations that haven't been assigned to anyone yet. This is where new incoming requests land before someone picks them up or triages them.
Below these built-in views, you'll see any inboxes that have been created for your organization. Clicking on an inbox filters the conversation list to show only conversations routed to that inbox.
Open and Closed Conversations
Every conversation is either open or closed.
A new conversation starts as open. Once the issue has been resolved, you can close it by clicking the close button in the conversation header. If the customer follows up again, you can reopen it.
In the conversation list, you can filter by status using the status filter at the top of the table:
By default, most views show open conversations.
How Assignment Works
Each conversation can be assigned to an inbox and/or a user.
Inbox assignment determines which team or category the conversation belongs to. When you assign a conversation to an inbox, it appears in that inbox's view for all members of that inbox.
User assignment determines who is personally responsible for the conversation. When you assign a conversation to a user, it appears in their "Your Inbox" view.
Notes on assignments:
If a conversation is already assigned to an inbox, you can only assign users from that inbox.
When you assign an inbox, existing user assignment will be erased.
You can assign both, either, or neither. For example, a conversation might be assigned to the "Billing" inbox but not to any specific user yet (it would show up in Unassigned), or it might be assigned directly to a user without an inbox.
Managing Inboxes
Creating an Inbox
Click the + button next to the "Inboxes" heading in the sidebar. Give your inbox a name, an optional description, and choose an emoji icon to help visually identify it.
Editing an Inbox
Hover over an inbox in the sidebar to see its hover card. From there you can edit the name, description, and icon.
Deleting an Inbox
You can delete an inbox from the inbox hover card. Deleting an inbox does not delete the conversations inside it — those conversations will simply become unassigned from any inbox and can be found in the "All" view.
Managing Inbox Members
Each inbox can have users assigned to it. Inbox members are the team members who work on conversations in that inbox. You can add or remove members from the inbox hover card.
When assigning a user to a conversation within an inbox, the user dropdown is filtered to show only members of that inbox. This helps ensure conversations are assigned to the right people.
Conversations Table
The conversation list shows key information at a glance for each conversation. Here's what you'll see and what you can do:
Bold Rows. Conversations with unread messages appear in bold. Once you open the conversation, it returns to normal weight.
Mark as Important. You can star a conversation to mark it as important. Click the star icon on the left side of a conversation row. Starred conversations are visually highlighted, so they stand out in your list.
Waiting Since. The "Waiting Since" column shows how long the conversation has been waiting for a response. This timer resets each time a lab user sends a reply. It helps you prioritize conversations that have been waiting the longest.
Assigning from the Table. You can assign an inbox and a user directly from the conversation table without opening the conversation
Filtering and Sorting. At the top of the conversation list you can:
Search by conversation title or case number
Filter by status — open, closed, or both
Filter by inbox — narrow down to a specific inbox
Filter by assigned user — see only conversations assigned to a particular person
Sort by last activity, creation date, title, or customer name