# Hand conversations to your team (/docs/conversations/handoff)

Handoff gives users a **Talk to a person** button when they need more help than Skavelo can give. Set it up on the agent's **Settings** tab, under **Talk to a person**.

## When users see the button [#when-users-see-the-button]

Once handoff is on, Skavelo offers a person when a user:

- asks to speak with a person, a human or support;
- marks an answer as unhelpful;
- asks something Skavelo can't answer;
- [reports a problem](/docs/conversations/problem-reports) Skavelo can't explain, or one caused on your product's side.

The button only appears when there's a way to reach your team from that page.

<Screenshot label="The 'Talk to a person' button under an answer in the widget" src="/screenshots/handoff-button.webp" url="app.acmebooks.com" alt="The widget answering that the team can be reached with the button below, with a Talk to a person button" />

## Choose how users reach you [#choose-how-users-reach-you]

<Tabs items={['Your support chat', 'Email', 'Your code']}>
<Tab value="Your support chat">

Skavelo opens the support chat that's already on your site. There's nothing to configure: it finds the chat on the page automatically.

| Chat tool | What happens to the user's question |
| --- | --- |
| Intercom, Crisp, Freshchat, Help Scout | Typed into the chat's message box, ready to send |
| Chatway | Sent to your team in the chat |
| Zendesk, HubSpot, Drift, LiveChat, Tawk.to, Tidio | The chat opens and the question is copied, so the user can paste it |

You can also add an email address as a fallback. On pages without a support chat, users can then reach you by email instead. Leave it empty to offer a person only on pages with a support chat.

</Tab>
<Tab value="Email">

Users enter their email address and, optionally, a note. Skavelo sends your team the full conversation, including who asked, why they asked for a person and the page they were on.

Reply to the email to answer the user directly: replies go straight to the address they entered. Each conversation is emailed once, only to the address you set.

</Tab>
<Tab value="Your code">

Skavelo fires a `handoff` event on the page, and your code handles the rest, for example by opening a support tool Skavelo doesn't recognize.

```js
const skavelo = Skavelo.init({ agentId: 'YOUR_AGENT_ID' });

skavelo.on('handoff', (event) => {
  // event.summary: what they asked and on which page, ready to send
  // event.reason: 'asked', 'unhelpful' or 'no_answer'
  openYourSupportChat(event.summary);
});
```

The event fires for every handoff, whichever method you choose. See [Widget events](/docs/developers/events).

</Tab>
</Tabs>

## What your team sees [#what-your-team-sees]

Every handoff marks the conversation as handed off. In [Conversations](/docs/conversations/conversation-log), filter by **Handed off** to see them all. Each transcript shows how the user was connected, why they asked for a person, and any email address and note they left.

When the user had reported a problem, the handoff also carries what Skavelo checked and the likely cause: in the email, in the message typed into your support chat, and in the `handoff` event. Your team starts from what's already known instead of asking the user to explain again.

<Callout title="Honest answers">
  With handoff on, Skavelo tells users they can reach the team with the button below. It never claims to have contacted anyone, and never invents a support email address or phone number.
</Callout>

<Callout type="info" title="See it in action">
  Examples and answers to common questions are on the [Handoff page](https://skavelo.com/features/handoff) on skavelo.com.
</Callout>