Automation for Jira offers powerful tools to streamline and automate repetitive tasks, allowing your team to focus on more strategic activities. One such example is the “Alert customer of potential auto-close” rule, designed to proactively notify customers before their issues are automatically closed. In this blog post, we’ll walk you through the details of this automation rule and how it can benefit your customer support process.

Rule Overview

The “Alert customer of potential auto-close” rule is set to run daily at 9:00 AM, checking for issues that are nearing their due date for customer response. The rule performs the following actions:

  1. Scheduling the Rule: The rule is triggered every day at 9:00 AM.
  2. Creating a Variable: A smart value variable {{customerResponseSLA}} is created to calculate the difference between the current date and the issue’s customer due date in business days.
  3. Checking Conditions: The rule checks if the number of business days remaining until the due date is 1, 4, or 7 days.
  4. Adding a Comment: If any of the conditions are met, a comment is added to the issue, notifying the reporter about the pending response.
  5. Closing the Issue: If the due date has arrived (0 business days remaining), the issue is transitioned to the “Completed” status, with the resolution set to “Timed Out”.

Additionally, there’s another simple automation that runs when the issue is transitioned to “Waiting for Customer” to set the Customer Due Date to 10 business days from the current date.

Detailed Breakdown

1. Scheduling the Rule

The rule is scheduled to run at a specific time each day. This ensures that customers are notified in a timely manner, giving them enough opportunity to respond before their issue is automatically closed.

Configuration:

  • When: Scheduled
  • Time: Every day at 9:00 AM
  • JQL: “Customer Due Date” is not empty AND status = “Waiting for customer”

2. Creating a Variable

A smart value variable is created to calculate the number of business days remaining until the customer due date. This variable is used to determine when to send notifications.

Action:

  • Create Variable: {{customerResponseSLA}}
  • Smart value: {{now.diff(issue.Customer Due Date).businessDays}}

3. Checking Conditions

The rule checks if the remaining business days are 1, 4, or 7. These intervals provide multiple reminders to the customer, increasing the chances of a timely response.

Conditions:

  • If any match:
    • {{now.diff(issue.Customer Due date).businessDays}} equals 1
    • {{now.diff(issue.Customer Due date).businessDays}} equals 4
    • {{now.diff(issue.Customer Due date).businessDays}} equals 7

4. Adding a Comment

When any of the conditions are met, a comment is added to the issue. This comment alerts the customer about the upcoming auto-close and encourages them to respond if they still need assistance.

Action:

  • Then: Add comment to issue
    • Comment: Hi [~accountId:{{reporter.accountId}}]. We noticed that you have not responded in a few days. Please let us know if you still need assistance. This ticket will close in {{customerResponseSLA}} days if there is no response.

5. Closing the Issue

If the due date has arrived and no response has been received, the issue is transitioned to the “Completed” status, with the resolution set to “Timed Out”. This step ensures that unresolved issues do not linger indefinitely, allowing the support team to focus on active issues.

Condition:

  • Else-if matches:
    • {{now.diff(issue.Customer Due date).businessDays}} equals 0

Action:

  • Then: Transition the issue to “Completed”
    • Resolution: Timed Out

6. Setting the Customer Due Date

Another simple automation rule is configured to set the Customer Due Date to 10 business days from the current date whenever an issue is transitioned to “Waiting for Customer”. This ensures that there is a clear deadline for customer response.

Configuration:

  • When: Issue transitioned to “Waiting for Customer”
  • Then: Set Customer Due Date to {{now.plusBusinessDays(10)}}

Benefits of Using This Automation

  1. Remind Customers to Respond: By sending timely reminders, customers are encouraged to respond to the agent’s queries, ensuring smoother resolution of their issues.
  2. Increased Efficiency: Automation reduces the manual workload for the support team, allowing them to focus on more critical tasks.

Conclusion

Implementing the “Alert customer of potential auto-close” rule in Automation for Jira is a simple yet effective way to enhance your customer support process. By ensuring timely notifications and automated issue management, your team can provide a better customer experience while maintaining efficiency. There are several ways to achieve this, but I believe this approach is the best and cleverest so far.