Skip to main content
All CollectionsGetting StartedBest practices
Setting up roles and permissions for Support
Setting up roles and permissions for Support

Set your Support team up for success with these permissions and roles in Intercom.

Laura Joyce avatar
Written by Laura Joyce
Updated this week

Before you invite teammates/agents to Intercom, you can create custom roles to easily manage permissions. Here are some best practices for setting up roles and permissions for a Support team...

Support team roles

When using Intercom for support, we recommend creating the following custom roles when first getting started:

  • Super admin role

  • Support agent role (limited or standard)

  • Support manager role

  • Specialty team roles

Super admin role

You should always have at least one "Admin" on your team with Complete Access to every available permission. They'll be responsible for controlling the permissions the rest of the team has access to.

Make sure you've selected Allow all permissions for this teammate.

Support agent role (limited)

Many teams often require individual contributors to have a limited set of permissions that allow them to work from the Inbox and not much else. Depending on your business, you may want to limit them to only some conversations (e.g. their team only, not all conversations).

  • Conversations Access

    • Conversations assigned to them only

  • Help Desk

    • Can reassign conversations and edit lead or user ownership

Support agent role (standard)

If you'd like to give you agents more responsibility, we can grant them the following additional permissions:

  • Conversation access:

    • Can access all conversations

  • Data and security

    • Can access people, companies, and account lists

    • Can access lead and user profile pages

  • Help Center Articles

    • Can create and update draft Help Center Articles

    • Can manage and publish Help Center Articles (optional)

    • Can manage saved views for Help Center Articles (optional)

  • Help Desk

    • Can access real-time dashboard

    • Can reassign conversations and edit lead or user ownership

    • Can manage shared Macros

  • Reports

    • Can access Reports

Support manager role

  • Conversation Access:

    • Can access all conversations

  • Settings

    • Can manage teammates, seats and permissions

    • Can manage teams

    • Can change status

    • Can manage Messenger settings

    • Can edit Default sender address

  • Data and security

    • Can manage workspace data

    • Can access people, companies, and account lists

    • Can access lead and user profile pages

    • Can export Lead, User, Company data

    • Can import leads and users

    • Can manage tags

  • Help Center Articles

    • Can create and update draft Help Center Articles

    • Can manage and publish Help Center Articles

    • Can manage saved views for Help Center Articles

  • Automation

    • Can manage Operator settings and Inbound Bots

    • Can manage outbound Workflows

  • Proactive Support

    • Can bulk message visitors, leads and users

    • Can publish News

    • Can send emails from custom addresses

    • Can export Proactive Support data

  • Help Desk

    • Can access real-time dashboard

    • Can reassign conversations and edit lead or user ownership

    • Can export conversation transcripts

    • Can delete replies and notes from a conversation

    • Can manage shared Macros

    • Can manage Views

    • Can manage Rules

    • Can manage Balanced assignment and Workload management

    • Can manage Round Robin assignment

    • Can manage Auto Away mode

    • Can manage teammate presence

  • Reports

    • Can access Reports

    • Can share Reports

    • Can export CSV

Speciality team roles

Outside of the roles listed above, you may have people on your team who need access to other specific areas of Intercom. For example, you could create the following custom roles depending on the teams you have:

Marketing team:

  • Conversations Access

    • Conversations assigned to them only

  • Settings

    • Can manage Messenger settings

  • Help Center Articles

    • Can create and update draft Help Center Articles

    • Can manage and publish Help Center Articles

  • Automation

    • Can manage outbound Workflows

  • Proactive Support

    • Can bulk message visitors, leads and users

    • Can publish News

    • Can send emails from custom addresses

    • Can export Proactive Support data

    • Has to use default rules in new messages

  • Add-ons

    • Can set Product Tours, Tooltips and Checklists live

    • Can set Surveys live

Developers:

  • Apps and Integrations

    • Can access Developer Hub

    • Can install, configure and delete apps

    • Messenger settings

Accounting:

  • Settings

    • Can manage Billing settings

The above roles and permissions are only suggestions and can be changed to suit your needs. Custom roles allow you to decide exactly which permissions each role has in your team.

Only one role can be assigned to a teammate at a time. A teammate can not be assigned multiple roles at once.

💡Tip

Need more help? Get support from our Community Forum
Find answers and get help from Intercom Support and Community Experts

Related Articles
Permissions: how to restrict access for some teammates
Manage permissions effortlessly with custom roles
Review actions taken in your workspace with Teammate activity logs
Seats
Getting started with Intercom
Did this answer your question?