Creating a new auto-close rule

You may want to have a plan for which tickets you want to target with your rule, as well as the thresholds you want to set for inactivity and closure. Once you've got those in hand, you're ready to dive into the instructions.

To add a new auto-close rule:

1. Sign into your admin control panel.
2. Under the Tickets section, click the Auto-close link.
3. Here you can see any rules your team has already configured and the default 'Close tickets after five days if we won't hear back from the customer' rule. Click the New button in the upper-right.
4. In the Rule title text box, enter a title for this auto-close rule.
5. From the Change status to drop-down, select either a default or custom 'resolved' status that you want the rule to move tickets into when it's closed.
NOTE:

To check whether the status is resolved or unresolved, go to Tickets > Statuses in the admin control panel and click a status to review its details.

6. In the Inactivity threshold box, specify the number hours after which GFI HelpDesk should mark the ticket as inactive.
7. In the Closure threshold box, specify the number of hours after which the ticket should go to the resolved status.
NOTE:

These thresholds are calculated using calendar hours, not business hours.

8. If you want to send an email to the customer when their ticket hits the inactivity threshold, set the Send inactivity notification email option to Yes.
9. If you want to send an email to tell the customer when their ticket is closed, set the Send final ticket closed notification email option to Yes.
10. You can also tell GFI HelpDesk not to send a survey invitation for automatically closed tickets, by setting the Suppress customer survey email option to Yes.
11. Set the Rule is enabled to Yes to enable the rule when you save it.
NOTE:

You can always come back and change this later.

12. The Execution order field gives you the chance to tell GFI HelpDesk which order to execute your auto-close rules, in case you have more than one enabled. The smaller the number you select here, the higher priority it takes.
13. Finally, in the last step, you can specify any criteria by which you want to limit the scope of your new rule. GFI HelpDesk automatically closes only tickets that match the criteria specified here.
NOTE:

If you use Ticket status as a criterion, you need to select 'unresolved' statuses.

14. When you're done defining your criteria, click the Insert button in the top toolbar to save your new rule.