Assigning a ticket says who owns it — which teammate is responsible for getting the customer an answer. It’s how a team of agents divides the work instead of everyone stepping on the same ticket.
Assignment (who owns it) is separate from handling (AI vs. human). A ticket can be handled by the AI and still be unassigned; assigning it to you doesn’t stop the AI — it just marks you as the person accountable for it. The two are different dials.
Assign a ticket
- Open the ticket. From the Tickets view, click a ticket to open it — in Teams or the web app. See the dashboard & views.
- Pick an owner. Use the assignee dropdown at the top of the ticket — it reads Unassigned until someone owns it — and choose a teammate, or use the button beside it to take it yourself.
- Done. The ticket now shows its owner in the list, and it drops out of the desk’s unassigned count.
Faster: press a on a ticket to assign it to yourself without touching the dropdown. See the inbox guide for the rest of the shortcuts.
Who can be an assignee? Anyone who’s a member of the desk — the people in your Teams channel who’ve opened AB Support. Assigning doesn’t email them; it sets ownership you can both see in the list and on the dashboard.
Assign several at once. In the ticket queue, tick the checkboxes next to the tickets you want — or the box in the header to take the whole current view — then choose Assign to me. The same bulk bar also does a bulk Resolve, with an undo if you catch a mistake. See the inbox guide.
A simple way to run the desk
| Signal | What to do |
|---|---|
| Unassigned and awaiting a person | Someone claims it — Assign to me, or a lead assigns it out. |
| You picked it up | Reply from the ticket (or from the Teams card). See how a ticket works. |
| Not your area | Reassign it to the right teammate from the assignee dropdown. |
Keep the desk’s unassigned count near zero and every waiting customer has a name attached — that’s the whole point of assignment.