Where you see decisions
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In the Inbox list, every thread row shows a status pill for what a Genie decided — Archived, Filed, Drafted reply, Reviewed, and so on. While a run is in flight you’ll see a live narration like “Thinking…”, “Archiving…”, “Filing → X”, or “Drafting reply…”.
- On a thread page, look for the one-line Genie reasoning strip above the acted message. Click it to see What Genie answered and Technical details — the questions it worked through and the pipeline behind the decision — and to reach Teach Genie and Run Genie without leaving the thread.
- In a mailbox’s Activity tab, click any row’s decision to open the full Decision Inspector — a “what did the Genie do and why” read-out. Overview shows the customer’s message, the reply that was prepared or sent, and a plain-language What happened summary; Full conversation shows the whole thread. If the decision is still waiting on you, you can approve or reject it right there. See Genies Home & Mailbox Detail.
What a Genie reads
A Genie doesn’t only read the email text. On the most recent incoming message it also looks at attachments:- Images — PNG, JPEG, GIF, and WebP files are shown to the Genie directly.
- Documents — PDF, plain text, CSV, TSV, and Word (
.docx) files have their text pulled out and included.
If an attachment is too large or can’t be read, that’s noted in the decision’s processing record — so you can tell when a Genie answered without seeing a file.
When a Genie escalates to you
If a Genie mailbox decides an email needs a person, it forwards the thread to that mailbox’s escalation address. At the same time, it sends the customer a short holding reply on the thread — two or three sentences acknowledging their message, with no promise about who will follow up or when. That way the sender isn’t left in silence while the escalation sits in your inbox. You’ll see this on escalations your Genie mailboxes send automatically, and on ones you approve yourself from the Decision Inspector. If the holding reply can’t be sent for some reason, the escalation still goes through, and the processing record on that decision shows what failed.The holding reply is on by default and there’s no switch for it in the brain editors. If a mailbox needs forwards to stay silent to the customer, ask support to turn the holding reply off for that mailbox.
Test mode
If a Genie mailbox is in test mode, its escalations go to Help Genie support (support@helpgenie.ai) instead of your escalation address, so a mailbox you’re still testing never lands in the real owner’s inbox. Your escalation address isn’t changed — turning test mode back off resumes normal forwarding without you re-entering it. Customers still get the holding reply either way.
There’s no test-mode switch in Mail — ask support to turn test mode on or off for a mailbox.
When a Genie can’t back up a reply
A Genie mailbox also escalates when it wanted to reply but couldn’t back the reply up. If it decides an email deserves an answer but can’t reach the knowledge it needs — no Genie attached to that mailbox, or the lookup fails — it forwards the thread to you instead of sending the customer an empty, generic reply. The thread row shows Forwarded rather than Replied, and the reasoning on that decision says it couldn’t ground a reply. The customer still gets the short holding reply.Threads with no inbound message
One thing a Genie won’t do is act on a thread where nothing has come in yet. If a Genie mailbox sent the first message and the customer hasn’t replied, that thread gets no Genie decision — it waits for a real inbound message.Suggested replies
When a Genie has drafted a reply for a thread, you’ll see a Suggested reply card on the thread page.
- Approve sends it as-is
- Edit lets you tweak the body first
- Ignore dismisses the suggestion
Shaping how a Genie behaves — the “brain”
There are two brain editors, and they use the same panel:- Settings → Triage — the general rules your Genie applies to your personal mail.
- Mailbox detail → Genie brain — the rules for one provisioned Genie mailbox.
