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Understanding Automated Mail Processing

These topics discuss:

AMP performs automated actions on inbound emails based on the email categories and their associated behavioral rules that are established in the system. The framework consists of these components and concepts:

  • Categories.

  • Actions.

  • Rules, rules engine, and mailbox relationships.

Categories

An email has to be associated with a category in order to be processed by AMP. The system uses PeopleSoft Search to identify categories for emails that are either:

  • Structured but aren't set to use the default email category specified in their corresponding webform definitions.

  • Unstructured and are not set to be route automatically.

AMP triggers email actions by matching the category and score value of an email to a list of rules that you define in the system. It uses these two pieces of information to find a behavioral rule with a matching email category and a confidence level that the email's score value meets, and invoke rule actions. PeopleSoft Customer Relationship Management delivers categories to be used for AMP. They are specified under a category set called AMP Categories, which includes Problem, Inquiry, Spam, Complaint, and Unsubscribe. To add custom categories to the AMP category set, create these categories under select Set Up CRM, then select Common Definitions, then select Correspondence, then select Categories & Types. Subsequently, add them to the AMP CATEGORIES category set in the Category Set page under select Set Up CRM, then select Product Related, then select Multichannel Definitions, then select Email, then select Define Category Set.

Actions

Through AMP, the email response management system (ERMS) can take immediate actions on the kinds of email that are relatively common and straightforward in terms of their purposes, such as making a complaint, filing a product problem, or requesting status information. The ERMS reduces agents' workload and helps them focus on resolving more complicated issues that are routed to them. You define email-specific actions that AMP can trigger using the action framework of the Active Analytics Framework. The action framework provides a flexible environment that enables you to implement custom actions by referencing your application class method in the runtime section of the action type definition. Specify an application class method in the design time section of the action type definition if you need to gather more details about the action from customers. The system triggers the design time code of an action when customers specify the action in a rule definition. Clicking the Configure link on the Define Automated Mail Processor Rule page enables customers to enter additional configuration details about that action for a particular rule.

System-delivered actions include Auto response, Auto acknowledge, Auto route, Auto suggest, Create case, Spam, and Unsubscribe.

Rules, Rules Engine, and Mailbox Relationships

A rule consists of a category, a threshold value, and a list of prioritized actions. Rules are subject to evaluation that is performed by the rules engine to determine which action to trigger for each email that it processes. In a rule definition, you specify the minimum confidence (threshold) score that an email with the same rule category has to meet for this rule to be applicable to this email. You can specify one or more actions in a rule and prioritize them.

When the rules engine obtains a category and threshold score for an email, it identifies the rule of that category that is specified in the mailbox definition to which the email is sent. The rules engine tries to take the action of the highest priority, one level at a time. If it cannot take the action for some reason (for example, the returned threshold score of the email is lower than the one specified at the action level), it moves to the next priority to see if it can trigger any action. If the rules engine cannot find any rule, or there is no action that can be triggered from the applicable rule due to low threshold score, the email is then routed to the default group worklist specified in the mailbox definition.

Note: AMP closes emails after auto responses are sent. If AMP cannot apply any rules to route emails that are in open status, they are routed to the default group worklist.

AMP supports the recommendation of actions to address issues that come in the form of unstructured and structured emails.

AMP is used to process unstructured email messages when automatic routing is disabled at the mailbox level, and structured email messages that are not set to use the default email category at the webform level. For each keyword match that is found, a score is given to the associated category. As a result, email is assigned to the category with the highest score, and the rules engine can then trigger the actions that are associated with that category on the email. If the score returned for the email category does not meet the confidence level of any AMP rules for that email category, or that the email category is not associated with any rules, the system routes the email to the default group worklist of the mailbox.

Please refer to the mail route process section for a diagram on how automated mail processing is used in the mail route process.

See The Mail Route Process.

The AMP rules engine uses PeopleSoft Search to calculate and return email score values. A score value is used to identify the category of an email and subsequently the AMP rule used to perform actions on that email. At design time, you specify keywords for each email category in the system. At runtime, the system searches for keywords in the subject line and body of an email and keeps score. The higher the number of keywords found for a category, the higher its score value. As a result, the email is assigned to the category with the highest score value.

See Category Set Page.

PeopleSoft CRM delivers AMP rules for categories created in the system:

Category

Rule Name

Action

Complaint

Complaint Rule -1

First priority:

  • Auto respond to email with minimum threshold value of 90 and maximum return of 1 solution.

  • Auto route email.

Complaint

Complaint Rule -2

First priority: Auto route email.

Problem

Problem Rule 1

First priority: Auto respond to email with minimum threshold value of 90 and maximum return of 5 solutions.

Second priority:

  • Create a case.

  • Auto route email.

Problem

Problem Rule 2

First priority:

  • Auto respond to email with minimum threshold value of 90 and a maximum return of 5 solutions.

  • Auto suggest solutions (maximum of 10) with minimum threshold value of 90. Auto suggest documents (maximum of 5) with minimum threshold percentage of 90.

  • Auto route email.

Problem

Problem Rule 3

First priority: Auto respond to email with minimum threshold value of 95 and maximum return of 5 solutions.

Second priority:

  • Send auto acknowledge email.

  • Create a case.

Problem

Problem Rule 4

First priority:

  • Create a case.

  • Auto route email.

Problem

Problem - Create Case

First priority: Auto respond to email with minimum threshold value of 90 and a maximum return of 5 solutions.

Second priority: Create a case.

Third priority: Send auto acknowledge email.

Inquiry

Inquiry Rule 1

First priority:

  • Auto respond to email with minimum threshold value of 90 and maximum return of 5 solutions.

  • Auto suggest solutions (maximum of 5) with minimum threshold value of 90. Auto suggest documents (maximum of 5) with minimum threshold percentage of 90.

  • Auto route email.

Inquiry

Inquiry Rule 2

First priority:

  • Auto suggest solutions (maximum of 10) with minimum threshold value of 80. Auto suggest documents (maximum of 5) with minimum threshold percentage of 80.

  • Auto route email.

Inquiry

Case Status Inquiry

First priority: Send auto response with case status.

Second priority: Send auto acknowledge email.

Inquiry

Service Order Status Inquiry

First priority: Send auto response with service order status.

Second priority: Send auto acknowledge email.

Inquiry

Order Status Inquiry

First priority: Send auto response with sales order status.

Second priority: Send auto acknowledge email.

Spam

Route spam to worklist

First priority: Mark the email as spam and route it to the specified group worklist.

Spam

Route spam to mailbox

First priority: Route email to the specified spam mailbox.

Spam

Delete spam

First priority: Delete email.

You specify a rule for each category in a mailbox definition. The rules engine references this information when it tries to find a rule that can apply to a categorized email belonging to a particular mailbox.