---
title: The Ticket Queue and Status Board
description: "**Support → All Tickets** is where your team works. It offers two ways to look at the same queue: a searchable, sortable table with bulk actions, and a read-only status board that shows the shape of the backlog at a…"
url: "https://rackhelm.com/documentation/the-ticket-queue/"
updated: "2026-09-24"
category: Support Desk
---

# The Ticket Queue and Status Board

**Support → All Tickets** is where your team works. It offers two ways to look at the same queue: a searchable, sortable table with bulk actions, and a read-only status board that shows the shape of the backlog at a glance. This article covers both, plus the trash.

## Before you start

> **Note:** The screen requires `view_tickets`. Bulk actions additionally require `assign_tickets` (and `close_tickets` or `delete_tickets` for those two specific actions). See [Roles & Permissions](/docs/roles-and-permissions/). Everything you see is scoped to your departments — see [How the helpdesk works](/docs/how-the-helpdesk-works/).

## The three views

The pills at the top left of the card switch which set of tickets the table loads.

| View | What it shows |
| --- | --- |
| **All Tickets** | Every ticket in your departments except closed ones, unless you tick **Include closed**. |
| **Assigned to me** | The same set, narrowed to tickets whose assignee is you. |
| **Trash** | Deleted tickets, limited to those deleted within the last 30 days. Older deletions are no longer listed here. |

A submission from the public contact form is not a ticket until the sender confirms their address, so nothing appears in any view until then — see [Guest tickets and the contact form](/docs/guest-tickets-contact-form/). Tickets carrying the legacy `pending_verification` status are also filtered out of every view.

![The ticket table toolbar showing the All Tickets, Assigned to me and Trash pills, the search box, the Include closed switch and the auto-refresh selector](/wp-content/uploads/rackhelm-docs/support-tickets-index-views.png)
The toolbar: view pills on the left, search, the **Include closed** switch and auto-refresh on the right.

## Searching and sorting

The search box matches on three things at once:

- the ticket **subject**;
- the ticket **number** — a leading `#` is stripped, so both `1042` and `#1042` work;
- the customer's **first name**, **last name** or **email address**.

> **Tip:** Search on the number only, not the prefix. The lookup compares against the stored number, so searching `ORB-1042` will not find `ORB-1042` — search `1042`.

Click any column header to sort. Sorting is done in the database, not in the browser, so it applies across the whole queue rather than only the current page. The default order is **Last update**, newest first. Page sizes are 50, 100 and 300, defaulting to 50.

### Auto-refresh

The **Refresh** selector reloads the table every 3, 5, 10, 15 or 30 minutes, or never. Your choice is remembered in your browser, per browser rather than per account. A refresh is skipped whenever you have rows ticked, so an auto-refresh cannot clear a selection you are part-way through acting on.

## Reading a row

| Column | Contents |
| --- | --- |
| **#** | The display number — prefix plus ticket number. |
| **Subject** | Truncated to 30 characters and linked to the ticket. In the trash view it is struck through and not clickable. |
| **Customer** | Name over email address. |
| **Status** | Coloured dot plus label. Deleted rows show **Deleted**. |
| **Priority** | Low, Medium or High badge. |
| **Dept** | Department name, or **None**. |
| **Assignee** | The agent's name, or an em-dash when unassigned. |
| **Last update** | Relative time; hover for the exact timestamp. |
| **Actions** | A menu with **View**, **Close Ticket** (when not already closed) and **Restore Ticket** (trash view only). |

## Bulk actions

Tick one or more rows — or the header checkbox to take the whole page — and a bar appears with a **Bulk edit** button. The modal offers five actions:

1. **Change status** — Open, Pending, Awaiting reply, On hold or Closed. Closing sends each customer the standard closure email, and any ticket that had no assignee is assigned to you as it closes.
2. **Change priority** — Low, Medium or High.
3. **Change department** — moves the tickets to another department.
4. **Assign staff** — pick an agent, or **Unassigned** to clear the assignee. Only accounts holding a staff role can be chosen; the server rejects anything else.
5. **Delete tickets** — moves them to the trash.

![The Bulk edit modal with the Action dropdown open showing status, priority, department, assign and delete](/wp-content/uploads/rackhelm-docs/support-tickets-bulk-modal.png)
The bulk-edit modal. The second field changes to match the action you pick.

> **Note:** Bulk actions are checked per ticket. Any ticket outside your departments, or beyond your permissions for that specific action, is skipped rather than applied, and the result message tells you how many were skipped — for example "12 ticket(s) updated successfully. 3 skipped (outside your departments or beyond your permissions)." A partially applied action is never reported as a clean success.

## The status board

The **Table / Board** toggle in the page header switches to a Kanban-style snapshot with one column per active status: **Open**, **Pending**, **Awaiting reply** and **On hold**. Each card shows the ticket number, department, subject, priority, customer name and the assignee's avatar. Clicking a card opens the ticket.

![The board view with four columns — Open, Pending, Awaiting reply and On hold — each holding ticket cards](/wp-content/uploads/rackhelm-docs/support-tickets-board.png)
The board is a read-only snapshot. Closed tickets never appear on it.

> **Warning:** The board is a snapshot of at most 240 active tickets in your departments and cannot be searched, filtered or dragged between columns. On a busy desk it will not show everything — use the table when the count matters.

Your last choice of table or board is remembered in your browser. The toggle is hidden in the trash view.

## The trash

Deleting a ticket is a soft delete: the thread, its messages, notes and attachments all stay in the database. Restore it with **Actions → Restore Ticket** from the trash view. Both the deletion and the restore are written to the ticket's activity log.

> **Note:** Deleting requires `delete_tickets`, which the built-in Support Agent role does not hold. Restoring requires the same permission.

## Troubleshooting

| Symptom | Cause and fix |
| --- | --- |
| A ticket you deleted is not in the trash | The trash view only lists tickets deleted in the last 30 days. The record still exists but is no longer surfaced here. |
| Bulk edit returns "You do not have permission to perform that action on the selected tickets." | Every selected ticket was skipped. Closing needs `close_tickets` and deleting needs `delete_tickets`, on top of `assign_tickets`. |
| Assigning in bulk fails validation | The chosen account does not hold a staff role. Tickets can only be assigned to staff, otherwise a customer would see the thread in their own portal. |
| Searching the full reference finds nothing | Drop the prefix and search the number alone. |
| The board looks short compared with the table | It is capped at 240 tickets. Switch to the table. |
| The table never refreshes on its own | Auto-refresh defaults to off, and it is stored per browser. Set it again on this machine. |