> ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.shoply.gg/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Support Tickets > Buyers ask you about an order, or anything else, from the customer panel, and read your replies there Support Tickets are under **Audience**, then **Support Tickets**. They are off for every store until you switch them on. ## Switching them on **Turn On Support Tickets**, in the middle of the page, switches them on. From then on the switch is in a card at the top of the page: **Support Tickets Is On**, or **Support Tickets Is Off**. While they are on, your [customer panel](/guides/customers-and-balance.md#the-customer-panel) has a **Support Tickets** page. While they are off: * the customer panel shows no **Support Tickets**, and nobody can open a ticket or write on one; * you cannot reply either, since the buyer could not read it, but you can still resolve and reopen; * every ticket is kept, and is there again when you switch them back on. ## What a buyer does A buyer signed in to your customer panel opens **Support Tickets**, then **New Ticket**: | | | | - | - | | **About** | One of their orders, named by what was in it, or **Something Else**. | | **Subject** | Up to 100 characters. | | **Message** | Up to 500 characters, with up to three pictures (**Add Picture**). | They have one open ticket at a time: while one is open, **New Ticket** is not offered and they write on that one instead. They read your replies on the ticket's page, are emailed when you reply, write back, and can mark it resolved themselves (**Mark as Resolved**). A resolved ticket's conversation ends with a message in blue saying so, and until when writing on it opens it again: in the customer panel for the buyer, and on the ticket's page for you, with who resolved it. A buyer who writes on a resolved ticket within 30 days opens it again, unless they have another one open. After 30 days they open a new one. ## The page Each ticket is in one of three states, coloured the same on the dashboard and in the customer panel: | | | | - | - | | **Waiting on You** | The buyer wrote last. In amber. | | **Answered** | You wrote last, and it waits on the buyer. | | **Resolved** | Done, by you, the buyer, or by itself. In green. | Four figures head the list: | | | | - | - | | **Waiting on You** | Tickets the buyer wrote on last, and how long the oldest has waited. | | **Open** | Every ticket not resolved, and how many of them are answered. | | **First Reply** | How long, on average, a ticket opened in the last 30 days waited for your first reply, and the change against the 30 days before. | | **Resolved** | Tickets resolved in the last 30 days. | Under them is the list, the latest message first. A dot before the subject marks one the buyer wrote on since you last opened it. **Show** narrows it to **Open**, **Waiting on You**, **Answered** or **Resolved**, and the search looks through subjects, the buyer's address, the latest message, and ticket and order IDs. ## A ticket A row opens the ticket's own page: the conversation, oldest first, with the buyer's messages on the left and yours on the right, and beside it **About This Ticket** (the buyer, the order it is about, when it was opened, its state) and **Their Orders**, the buyer's latest five. Under the conversation you write a reply, with up to three pictures. **Send Reply** sends it and the ticket is **Answered**. **Reply and Resolve** sends it and resolves the ticket. **Resolve Ticket** in the page's head resolves it without a word, and on a resolved ticket it is **Reopen Ticket**. A ticket you answered is resolved by itself 48 hours later if the buyer has not written since. One waiting on you is never resolved by time. ## Writing a message Messages are written in Markdown, the buyer's and yours: `**bold**`, `*italic*`, `` `code` ``, lists, quotes and blocks of code. An address typed into a message is a link by itself. So that a link cannot hide where it goes, or show either of you anything the other did not mean to: * every link opens in a new tab, and goes only to a web address or an email address; * a link whose words are not its address shows where it goes after it, as `(example.com)`; * a picture written in Markdown is shown as a link to it and never loaded. Pictures go in a message as files, with **Add Picture**. ## Kept up to date The list and a ticket's page keep themselves up to date while they are open, on your dashboard and in the customer panel. A new message, a new ticket, and a ticket resolved or opened again show within a few seconds, with no reload, and whatever you are typing stays in the box. A page in a tab you are not looking at asks nothing until you come back to it. ## The limits | | | | - | - | | A message | 500 characters, yours too. | | A subject | 100 characters. | | Pictures | Three to a message, each a PNG, JPEG or WebP of up to 5 MB, and 25 in a conversation, both sides together. A reply may be pictures alone. | | Open tickets | One a buyer, and 250 at your store at once. A buyer can still write on one already open when your store is at 250. | | A buyer's messages | 100 a day. Yours are not counted. | Pictures are private: they are seen on your dashboard, by your API keys with **Read Support Tickets**, and by the buyer in their customer panel, and nowhere else. ## Being told | | | | - | - | | **Email Me About Support Tickets** | Under **Settings**, then **Notifications**, then **By Email**. A new ticket, and each message a buyer writes on one. On for every store, and with no address typed it goes to your account's email. | | **Support Tickets** | Under **On Discord**'s **Post About**. The same, posted with the buyer's words. Off to start. | Each ticket emails you at most once in 15 minutes. What a buyer writes meanwhile comes together in one email when the 15 minutes are over. The buyer is emailed your replies the same way, with **View Your Ticket**, which opens it in your customer panel. ## Your server [Webhook](/guides/webhooks.md) events: `ticket.opened`, `ticket.message`, `ticket.resolved` and `ticket.reopened`. See [Webhook events](/api-reference/webhook-events.md). With an [API key](/guides/api-keys.md), your server can list tickets, read one, reply, resolve, reopen, switch Support Tickets on or off, and read a ticket's pictures. Each message has its `body` as written and its `html`, the words as Markdown draws them, escaped and safe to show as they are. Reading needs **Read Support Tickets** and the rest **Answer Support Tickets**. A reply sent with a key is words only: pictures are sent from the dashboard. See [Support Tickets](/api-reference/support-tickets/list-support-tickets.md) in the API reference. The [Customer API](/guides/customer-api.md) has the buyer's half, for a support page on your own site or in an app: a buyer lists their tickets, opens one, reads one, writes on it and resolves it. Its messages are words only too, and a picture in one is named but not sent. This documentation is built and hosted on [Mintlify](https://mintlify.com), a developer documentation platform.