Priorities and how to triage

Every ticket has a priority: low, medium, high or urgent. Priority does not change routing by itself, it changes what your team sees first when they sort the inbox.

A simple rule that works for most SMB teams:

• Urgent: the customer cannot use the product at all, or money is at risk.
• High: an important feature is broken, but a workaround exists.
• Medium: the default for questions and small issues.
• Low: feedback, feature ideas and non-blocking requests.

Set the priority from the ticket sidebar. Agree the definitions with your team once and write them down, because consistent triage is what makes the inbox trustworthy.

A simple rule for each level

• Urgent: the customer cannot work at all and money or reputation is at stake right now.
• High: an important function is broken but there is a workaround.
• Medium: the normal question, the default for most tickets.
• Low: a suggestion, a cosmetic detail, or something with no deadline.

Triage in three minutes

1. Skim the new tickets and set the priority without answering yet.
2. Answer everything urgent, even if the answer is only "we are on it".
3. Work down from high to low, and reserve one slot a day for the low pile so it never rots.

Good to know

Priority drives the SLA timer and the breach alerts, so an honest priority is worth more than a flattering one. If almost everything is urgent, nothing is: recalibrate with the team once a month using the reports.