Introduction to the Human in the Loop (HitL) ​

Human in the loop (HitL) is a toolkit designed to integrate human agent supervision into existing Bots and Flows.

You can incorporate HitL when a text/voice-based solution requires human intervention due to the limitations of the pre-defined Bot responses, which, in turn, enables the offloading of a complex Bot business logic onto a human. With HitL, agents can benefit from real-time monitoring of Bot executions, allowing them to promptly address any issues that may arise. Additionally, HitL supports multi-channel conversations, allowing agents to seamlessly engage with customers across different communication channels. The voice real-time transcript feature allows agents to closely monitor conversations with customers, ensuring effective customer interactions. HitL also enables customization of the [HitL] Agent UI, providing companies with a personalized and branded experience. Finally, you can set up HitL to act as a live assistant, offering agents valuable tips and guidance within specific conversations.

What HitL consists of ​

The HitL toolkit includes:

• A set of Steps that, when added to your Flows, enable HitL
• UI tools where agents can interact with HitL conversations - the [HitL] Agent UI View and UI tools where agents can customize their experience - the [HitL] Settings and [HitL] UI Customizer Views
• A set of SDK methods to manipulate HitL data (conversations, events, and agent data) directly

You will interact most with Step templates and Views. You can download both from the Library.

Difference between HitL and Live Agent ​

Live Agent is a product that uses the Human in the Loop (HitL) toolkit at its core. It comprises pre-configured Flows and Views, facilitating a straightforward installation process for users. The primary objective of Live Agent is to equip call and support centers with efficient means to interact with their customers. Currently, Live Agent supports five distinct interaction channels: SMS, Voice (PSTN phone calls), RWC, Facebook Messenger, and WhatsApp. This allows agents to initiate or respond to both calls and text conversations. Additionally, Live Agent provides agent supervisors with the capability to view reports based on agents and channels. Supervisors can also establish agent groups and define certain aspects of business logic, such as prompts and working hours. However, it's important to note that the pre-built business logic of Live Agent does not include a complex Interactive Voice Response (IVR) or Interactive Text Response (ITR) component. Instead, it prioritizes connecting customers and agents as quickly as possible. If your business requires an IVR/ITR or any other Bot-customer interaction, there are several options available. You can modify the Flows of Live Agent, build a HitL-enabled solution from scratch, or integrate HitL into existing Bots.

Reporting events in HitL ​

Reporting events are the basis of all messages you can see in the HitL UI.
Every Step in the Flow during its execution produces a Reporting event. In essence, a Step performs an action and subsequently logs relevant information, such as what occurred, where it happened, and when it took place, using javascript objects. All events within HitL are represented as messages and sorted out by timeline within the [HitL] Agent UI. Certain events, such as Step events, are hidden by default, as they are most useful while debugging. Apart from Reporting events, HitL Steps introduce their own set of events, which are transformed into informative messages within the [HitL] Agent UI as well.

Session in HitL ​

A Flow session is one continuous execution of a Flow from the first Step to the last one. Within the framework of HitL, a session (or conversation, used interchangeably) is one continuous execution of a “conversation” (Bot-agent-customer interaction). Depending on the solution's complexity, this interaction may comprise one or more Flow sessions. It carries information pertinent to the HitL UI, including type, status, metadata, tags, and Flow events like Transcript messages.

Each HitL session must be linked to a contact record in the Contact record database using a unique identifier. These identifiers vary depending on the communication channels. For instance, in RWC, the identifier is the browser fingerprint, whereas, for SMS, it's the phone number. By default, all sessions in the UI are associated with the contact to which they belong.

Session types ​

A HitL session can be one of the following types: phone, SMS, RWC, email, HTTP, Slack, Skype, Viber, Telegram and WhatsApp. At the moment, we use the session type to display it in the UI, so that the agents know what interaction channel is used.

Session statuses ​

A session in HitL can have the following statuses:

• Active: indicates that the session is still ongoing, and a message exchange between the agent and customer is possible
• Closed: signifies that the message exchange is no longer possible. The session has reached its conclusion
• Claimed: means that the session is active and an agent has been assigned to it. The agent is currently interacting with the session, and engaging with the customer. Learn how to claim a conversation here
• Active and awaiting: a session in this state is awaiting for a human agent to claim it

Session tags ​

Sessions can contain tags designed for better visibility and easier processing. You can add session tags from the [HitL] Agent UI or from within the Flow. Learn how to add session tags from the [HitL] Agent UI here.

Agents ​

Agents are OneReach.ai account users who can belong to any number of Rule groups and who are allowed to see the conversations in the [HitL] Agent UI and interact with them. Not all agents can see all sessions. To enable specific groups of agents to view certain sessions while restricting access to others, it is necessary to define rule tags for the sessions and establish rules based on these tags for the respective agent groups.

Rule groups ​

The Rule group represents a collection of rules, based on tags, that determine which conversations agents can view and engage with. You need to assign at least one rule tag to a conversation, otherwise the conversation won't be visible to any agent. Similarly, an agent has to be assigned to at least one Rule group to be able to interact with HitL conversations via the [HitL] Agent UI. Tags in the rules should always start with one of the following “modifier” symbols: |, &, !:

1. Pipe symbol | (for example, |voice): if a rule carries a tag that begins with this symbol, it means that an agent belonging to that group can view the conversation tagged with that tag.

2. Exclamation mark ! (for example,!text): this modifier hides conversations. If a rule carries this tag modifier, then an agent belonging to that group will never be able to see the conversation tagged with that tag.

3. Ampersand & (for example,&rwc): if a rule carries this tag modifier, then for an agent belonging to that group to see a conversation it must contain that tag necessarily.

For example, an agent belonging to a Rule group with the following rules |voice !sms is able to interact with voice sessions, but not sms sessions. Learn how to add Rule groups here.

UI tools in HitL ​

Available UI tools are all Action desk Views. There are three Views you can interact with in HitL. You can download all from the Library:

• [HitL] Agent UI View: enables agents to engage in conversations with customers, interact with any agent-level instruments that might have been set up via the UI customizer, and change a small subset of the overall HitL settings applicable to them individually
• HitL settings View: provides agents with the capability to configure all necessary parameters, like Rule groups, message templates, event templates, status lists, etc.
• UI customizer View: allows for customization of the HitL UI layout, plugin introduction, and appearance modification