There are a few key reasons to close tickets that remain in a pending status. Most often, it’s because the customer has gone silent and hasn’t replied to the agent’s last message. These tickets can sit pending for a long time, keeping agents unaware of whether their solution worked or whether a customer is happy with the solution. Furthermore, unclosed tickets distort individual and team performance metrics, especially in the summary reports.
For technical support cases, the simplest approach is to automatically close pending tickets after a short grace period, while sending a closure notification to the customer. For other inquiries, like general questions about a product or service, you might choose to skip that notification. In a practice, there’s no industry-wide rule dictating exactly how long you should wait after the agent’s last response, or whether to notify the customer. These decisions should be guided by the help desk Service Level Agreement (SLA) or, in some cases, by internal business policy, e.g., when the system is used as HR help desk software.
Overview
In this guide, we will present an outline on how to configure workflow rules to meet the following goal:
If a customer hasn’t replied for 48 hours after the agent’s last response, automatically close the ticket and notify both the customer and the agent via a specific email template.
For demonstration purposes, we’ll focus this example on tickets submitted under the “Technical support” topic. You can apply the same approach to any other attribute.
In SympoQ, there isn’t a dedicated “auto-close pending tickets” setting or similar out-of-the-box option. Instead, the built-in workflow engine handles these requirements without any additional plugins or installations. You simply configure scheduled actions that monitor time-based conditions and automatically close pending tickets.
Prerequisites
Before you configure the rule, make sure you have two email templates prepared for sending notifications when a ticket closes automatically:
- notification for the customer
- notification for the agent.
If these templates do not exist, follow the guide to set them up:
- Navigate to Settings > Email templates.
- Click the [+] Custom template to create a custom template.
The rest of the settings depend on which of the templates is being created, i.e., whether it should notify the customer or the agent. Please note that you can use template placeholders for various attributes.
For customer notification, enter the following values:
- Name: Enter a descriptive label, e.g., “Auto-close ticket – for Customer”
- Recipient: Choose “Customer“
- Subject-The email’s subject line: “Ticket [#ticket_id#] Closed – #subject#“
- Header: Hello #username#
- Body: We have not received any response from you regarding ticket [#ticket_id#] related to [#subject#], so we assume that your issue has been resolved, and we have closed the ticket. If you still require assistance or have any additional questions, please feel free to reply, and we will be happy to help.
- Footer: You can view the ticket at any time at the following link: #ticket_url#. Sincerely, Your Help Desk Team.
The agent notification template might be very similar, with a small difference:
- Name: Enter a descriptive label, e.g., “Auto-close ticket – for Agent“
- Recipient: Choose “Agent“
- Subject: “Ticket [#ticket_id#] Closed – #subject#“
- Header: Hello #username#
- Body: The ticket [#ticket_id#] related to [#subject#] assigned to you has been closed due to inactivity, and the customer [#username#] has been informed.
- Footer: To check the details, log in to the Support Portal.
This encompasses everything required for the prerequisites to configure workflow rules. Once you have created these templates (click Create) you will find two new templates added to the templates list, as illustrated in the following image.
Click the preview icon to check an example of the email notification:
Step by Step Configuration
Once the prerequisites have been established, the steps for creating a scheduled action are as follows:
- Open workflow rules
- Go to Settings > Automation > Workflow rules, then go to the Scheduled actions list.
- Create a new rule
- Click + Add Schedule to create a new scheduled action.
- Describe the rule
- In Description, enter a clear name and description, e.g., “Auto close after 48 h no customer reply and notify assignee and customer.” This helps with maintenance and auditing.
- For Priority, select 10.
- Define the time-based condition (no customer reply for 48h)
- In If the following conditions are met section, add a time dependent condition using the provided fields:
- Ticket is not: Responded by Customer
- For: (48) (hours)
- Event type: After being responded by Agent
- This combination captures “no customer reply for two days after the agent’s last response”.
- Optionally, restrict this rule to the topic “Technical support“.
- In If the following conditions are met section, add a time dependent condition using the provided fields:
- Set up ticket updates (close it)
- In Set these values section, set Status to Closed. You can optionally add tags or adjust other fields, but Status is the key to auto closing.
- Configure email notifications in the Notify section:
- Toggle on Customer as the recipient.
- Select the email template from the list: “Auto-close ticket – for Customer”.
- Toggle on Assignee as the recipient.
- Select the email template from the list: “Auto-close ticket – for Assignee”.
- Leave Queue Manager off unless you also want them notified.
- Toggle on Customer as the recipient.
- Save the rule
- Click Submit to activate the scheduled action.
Afterward, the new action will appear in the scheduled actions list, which also shows the number of Pending tickets that match the rule and will be processed on the next run.
The action is triggered by a cron job. When tickets meet the condition window (Step 4.), the helpdesk automation tool will close them and send an email to the assignee and customer using the selected templates.
Refinement
Keep the following best practices for this and other similar scenarios:
- Fast track a test: For validation, temporarily set the window to (1) hour, reply as an agent on a test ticket, wait the hour, and confirm the ticket auto closes and the assignee and customer receive the templated email.
- Tighten scope: If needed, add extra conditions (e.g., specific Queue or Customer group) to limit where the rule applies.
- Avoid conflicts: Keep only one active auto close rule targeting the same scenario to prevent duplicate notifications or status churn.
- Additional value: Consider to add an extra tag to the Set these values section. For example, set the “Auto-closed” tag to enable an additional support ticket classification. This is helpful in searching the ticket list, as well as in the analytics reporting.
- Multiple scope: Keep in mind that you can use scheduled actions for a wide array of tasks, such as escalating a ticket up to Level 2 or Level 3 support.
By setting up scheduled actions to automatically close pending tickets, you’ll keep your support queue clean and your metrics accurate. You’ll no longer wonder if a silent ticket slipped through the cracks—agents and customers both receive clear notifications, and your team can focus on the truly active issues that drive satisfaction and revenue.
