Get and answer mail in a shared inbox

Your base has its own mail address, and each mail sent to it comes into the Inbox with its sender, subject, text and attachments. Give the address to your customers and suppliers as you would a team mailbox. A new mail waits in the Inbox of the users who give it to someone (Choose who gives new mail an owner).

The base's mail address is named as its web address is: the base at shop-k7q2.basecaptain.app gets shop-k7q2@…, and the example shop of these pages gets shop@….

Addresses with a +

A base can also have addresses with a part after a +, such as shop+requests@…, each for an automation that makes an item from each mail (Make an item from each mail that comes in). A mail to such an address makes its item and does not come into the Inbox. A mail to a part that no automation has, such as shop+sales@…, comes into the Inbox, with the part it was sent to.

An item's own address, such as shop+r-k7q2…@…, takes mail to that item: the mail goes on the item as a comment, not into the Inbox (Give each item its own mail address).

Answers to the emails your base sends

Customers also answer the emails your base sends them. While the base takes mail (Turn mail on for your base) and has no Sender address in Settings, Mail, their answers come back to the base: an answer to an email about an item, such as an invoice, lands on that item as a comment, and an answer to any other email comes into the Inbox (Run actions when an item changes). With a sender address, the answers go to that address (Name your emails and choose where answers go).

A new base takes no mail. The base's builders choose the mail it takes:

1. Click Settings, then Mail.
2. Under Mail the base takes, pick one, then click Save settings.

• Off: the base takes no mail.
• Automations only: the base takes the mail to the addresses of its automations, and the answers to the emails it sent. Mail to the base's own address, and to a part that no automation has, does not come in.
• All mail: the base takes every mail, and the mail to its own address comes into the Inbox.

A mail the base does not take is dropped. While the base takes no mail, it still sends its emails, but they have no address to answer to. You can also turn on Automations only from the first button that mails a customer (Let customers answer your first mail).

On the Free plan

On the Free plan, a base takes mail, and sends mail to addresses outside the base, once an owner adds a payment method, with no charge. Until then, no mail comes in, and the base mails only its own users who have joined: a mail to any other address, an invited user who has not joined yet too, is refused with "Without a payment method, this base sends mail only to its users. Add a payment method to mail other addresses. This is only to prevent fraud and abuse. You will not be charged." (What the Free plan includes).

A button that mails such an address, such as Mail the order, says this in its box before you confirm, and sends nothing: an owner gets Add a payment method there, and the other users read "Ask an owner of the base to add a payment method." After the payment method is added, you come back to the same page: click the button again to send the mail.

The Inbox shows every open mail of the base to the users who see Mail, with the notifications, newest first (Choose who sees Mail). A mail goes to the top when it comes in and when a reply opens it again. The mail that waits for you is at the top of the list, and shows once.

Each row shows the sender's name, or their address, the subject, a paperclip when the mail has files, its owner, or Unassigned, and when it came. The notifications of a mail, such as "New mail: …", do not show as rows of their own beside it. The count beside Inbox in the rail counts every open mail of your Inbox too, and goes down when a mail is Done.

Click a mail to open it in the pane at the right: its subject, its sender, Assigned to, the buttons Make an item and Done, the mail's text and files, then the conversation, your team's answers and the sender's replies, and the box to answer. Opening a mail changes nothing. On a phone, the list and the mail each take the whole screen.

Each mail has one owner, Assigned to: the user who answers it. Only a user who may see Mail can be an owner (Choose who sees Mail).

1. A new mail has no owner. It waits at the top of the Inbox of every triager, the oldest first, and each triager gets the notification "New mail: …" with its subject.
2. The first triager who gives the mail an owner takes it: the mail leaves the other triagers' Inboxes and waits at the top of the owner's Inbox until it is Done.
3. The owner gets the notification "Admin gave you a mail: …", unless they took the mail themselves.

The triagers are the users who give each new mail an owner. The base's builders pick them:

1. Click Settings, then Mail.
2. Under the triagers, pick the users, such as Jane Cooper and Admin. You can pick only users who may see Mail. Click Save settings.

If you pick no user, the triagers are the base's admins, the users of an admin role.

Base Captain reads the list of triagers each time someone opens an Inbox, and never writes it on a mail. A change of the list also moves the mail that waits already: remove a triager, and the mail with no owner leaves their Inbox at once. So a triager who is away stops nothing, and nobody hands their mail over. A user who can no longer see Mail is no longer a triager; when no triager is left, the admins are the triagers.

Any user who may change a mail sets its owner, a triager or not. In the mail's pane, beside Assigned to:

• Assign to me makes you the owner.
• Pick a user to make them the owner. The list shows the users who may see Mail. You can also give a mail that has an owner to another user.

Two triagers can open the same mail at the same time. If someone took the mail before you, Base Captain tells you who, such as "Ben Ionescu took this mail already.", and changes nothing. The pane then shows the mail as it is now.

Each change of owner is in the mail's history, with who made it: a person, the API, the assistant, an agent or Triage.

Give back sends a mail that is not for you back to the triagers. Only the mail's owner gives it back:

1. Open the mail and click Give back.
2. Write why, if you like, such as "Not a billing question". The reason is not necessary. Confirm.

The mail has no owner again and waits in the triagers' Inboxes. The triagers get the notification "Mark gave back a mail: …" with the reason. The reason is a comment on the mail, by you. It is never mailed to the sender. So a triager, the assistant and an agent read why the mail came back.

Triage, in Settings, Triage, can also give a mail its owner. What Triage reads, when it gives a mail to nobody and how the triagers are told are under Let Triage start workflows, fill in fields and give out mail.

To answer a mail, write in the box under the mail, attach files if you like, and send. The answer goes to the sender as a mail from Base Captain's address under your base's name, such as "Shop via Base Captain", with your files attached, and shows in the conversation.

The sender's reply

The sender's reply comes back to the mail's own address, which nobody can guess, lands on the same mail and shows in the conversation marked By mail, with the quoted text cut and its attachments as its files. The reply opens the mail again and goes to the Inbox of the mail's owner. When the mail has no owner, the reply goes to the user who answered last, and when nobody answered yet, to the triagers (See everything open for you in the Inbox).

Write with AI and saved replies

The AI menu beside the answer box drafts an answer from the mail and its conversation, rewrites or translates what you wrote, and summarizes the conversation; it also shows a mail in your language. The text stays in the box until you send it (Write, rewrite and translate with AI).

Type / in the answer box to put in a saved reply: its text comes in with the sender's values, such as their name, and you change it before you send. A saved reply needs no AI (Put in a saved reply with /).

A mail is Open until someone clicks Done on it, when it is answered or needs nothing more: on its row in the Inbox, or in its pane. A mail that is Done leaves every Inbox, with its notifications, and keeps its owner.

To find a mail that is Done, use Search: it finds the mail, open or Done, and opens it in the Inbox's pane, where Reopen brings it back to Open. When the sender replies to a mail that is Done, the mail opens again by itself.

Make an item turns a mail into an item of one of your lists, such as a request or an order:

1. Open the mail and click Make an item.
2. "Pick what this mail becomes. Its form opens filled from the mail.": pick the list, such as Quote request. You see the lists you may add items to.
3. The list's new form opens, filled from the mail: the sender's address in its first email field, the subject in the field that names an item, the mail's text in its first long text field. Above the form, it says which files field the mail's files are attached to when you save; a list with no files field leaves them on the mail. Check the form, change what you like, and click Save.

The item is made, with its own copies of the files, and the mail links to it: open the item from the mail. A mail turns into one item only, so Make an item is gone from a linked mail. Replies from the sender still land on the mail.

Mail in Base Captain has these limits:

• A mail that comes in may be up to 25 MB, attachments included, and up to 20 attachments are kept.
• Mail takes 60 mails a minute; more wait and come in a little later.
• The files of an answer may be 25 MB together at most. More is refused with "The files are too big to mail: 25 MB at most.", and nothing is saved or sent: remove a file and send again.
• Only a person answers a mail. The assistant and the base's agents read mail and work on it, but never send an answer.