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Freshdesk

With the Freshdesk integration, your ChatNorris agent resolves support questions with the articles from your Freshdesk knowledge base and, if that isn’t enough, opens the ticket without the visitor leaving the chat. Depending on what you turn on, the agent:
  • answers with the public articles from your Freshdesk knowledge base (Solutions), without you having to copy them by hand;
  • creates a ticket in Freshdesk, only after showing a summary and receiving the visitor’s confirmation;
  • tells the status of a ticket it created itself, after verifying the number and the email.
A single connection per agent covers both: the knowledge base and the tickets. The Action works in the web widget, WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger, Telegram, Email, and the API.

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Requirements

  • A ChatNorris account on the Standard or Premium plan. You can see the plans at chatnorris.ai/pricing.
  • At least one agent created in ChatNorris. If you don’t have one yet, follow Create an agent.
  • A Freshdesk account and a Freshdesk agent with permission to create and view tickets, whose API key you’ll copy.
  • The Owner or Admin role in your ChatNorris organization.

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Connect Freshdesk

Freshdesk is connected only once per agent, from Integrations, with your account’s subdomain and the API key of a Freshdesk agent. The Freshdesk Tickets Action and the Freshdesk knowledge source share it.
1

Copy the API key in Freshdesk

Sign in to Freshdesk with the agent that will sign the tickets. We recommend a dedicated one, for example “ChatNorris”. Click your profile picture (top right) → Profile settings, click View API key, complete the captcha, and copy it.
2

Open the agent's Integrations hub

In ChatNorris, go to My agents → [your agent] → Integrations and choose Freshdesk.
3

Fill in the subdomain and the API key

In Freshdesk subdomain, enter your account’s subdomain (yourcompany.freshdesk.com). If you use a custom domain, still enter your .freshdesk.com subdomain (you’ll find it in Admin → Portals). In API key, paste the key you copied and click Connect.
4

Test the connection

Click Test connection to confirm that the credentials work. The card shows which Freshdesk agent it’s connected as (“Connected as …”).
The API key has the same permissions as the Freshdesk agent who owns the key, and that agent is the one who signs the tickets. Check that it can create and view tickets.
The API key is stored in ChatNorris and the hub only shows its last 4 characters. ChatNorris creates tickets in your Freshdesk only when the visitor confirms, and only checks the status of tickets the agent created: it never reads or changes other tickets or data in your account. Connecting Freshdesk doesn’t turn anything on by itself. For the agent to use the account, create the Freshdesk Tickets Action or add the knowledge source.

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Change the API key

If you rotated the API key in Freshdesk, use Replace key in the ··· menu of the Freshdesk row in the hub, or paste the key in New API key inside the card and click Update connection. The connection stays the same, so the Action and the source that use it are not affected.

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Configure the Action

The Freshdesk Tickets Action lets the agent create support tickets and check their status without leaving the chat. There can be only one Freshdesk Tickets Action per agent.
1

Create the Freshdesk Tickets Action

Go to My agents → [your agent] → Actions, click New action, and choose Freshdesk Tickets. The Freshdesk account section shows the connected account; if you haven’t connected one yet, the Manage connection in Integrations link takes you to the hub.
2

Choose what it can do

In What it can do, turn on Create tickets, Check status, or both (see below).
3

Define when it should be used

In When to use this action, tell the agent in which situations it should offer to create a ticket. The field comes with default text that you can adapt or restore with Restore default text. Confirmation and verification remain mandatory even if you change this text.
4

Configure verification and ticket values

Fill in Verification to check tickets and Ticket defaults (see below).
5

Turn on the Action and save

Turn on Enabled and save. From then on, the agent uses your Freshdesk in its new conversations.
Claude Sonnet or higher is recommended as the agent’s main model (Settings → AI). The Action asks for explicit confirmation before creating a ticket or revealing data from a verified ticket, and in our testing Haiku sometimes answers as if the ticket already existed without having created it. The Action’s form shows this notice with a link to the AI settings.

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Create tickets

The agent creates a ticket after collecting the visitor’s subject, description, name and email (and phone, if you turn it on in verification). It creates the ticket only with the name and email the visitor wrote in the conversation, and only after showing a summary and receiving an explicit “yes”. See which replies count as confirmation in Visitor confirmations. In Ticket defaults you choose what tickets are created with in Freshdesk:
  • Priority: Low (default), Medium, High, or Urgent.
  • Tags: comma-separated. By default, chatnorris.

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Check status

The agent shows only the subject and status of tickets created by this agent, after verifying the number and the email. In Verification to check tickets:
  • Ticket number and Email are always required.
  • If you turn on Phone, the agent also asks for it when creating the ticket, and it must match when looking it up.
Email and phone are stored only as a hash, never in plain text.

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Resolve first, then the ticket

Ticket actions (Zendesk, Freshdesk and the Odoo Helpdesk) follow a fixed rule, above whatever you write in When to use this action:
  • If the visitor describes a problem or asks a question without asking for a ticket, the agent answers with the knowledge base. If it can’t solve it, or the visitor says the answer didn’t help, it offers to create the ticket.
  • If the visitor asks for a ticket directly, the agent first offers help (with the answer, if it has one, or by asking what’s going on) and asks whether they still prefer the ticket.
  • The ticket is started if the visitor insists, if the agent already tried and didn’t have the information, or if the answer didn’t help.
Checking the status of an existing ticket doesn’t go through this step. During a ticket flow, the agent also doesn’t offer the Lead Form or a transfer to a person, so as not to confuse the visitor.
If the visitor asks to open a ticket or a support case and the agent has the Freshdesk Tickets Action active, the agent uses that action instead of transferring the conversation to a person with Human Handoff.
Tickets the agent creates in the Playground are real. If the agent has the Action active, before the first test message you’ll see the notice This test can create real data.

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Tickets from Google reviews

If you use the Google Reviews channel, you can have every negative review open a ticket in Freshdesk. You need the Freshdesk Tickets Action with Create tickets on. See Google Reviews → Support tickets.

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Import articles into the knowledge base

You can bring the articles from your Freshdesk knowledge base (Solutions) so the agent answers with them, instead of copying them by hand.
1

Add the source

Go to My agents → [your agent] → Knowledge Base → Add source and choose Freshdesk. If you haven’t connected the account yet, the source panel takes you to Integrations with Go to Integrations.
2

Choose what to import

Choose Whole public knowledge base or Pick categories and folders (a chosen folder includes its public subfolders). Then click Import articles.
3

Wait for the first sync

It may take several minutes depending on the number of articles. You can follow the progress in the source list.
Public content only. Only published articles from folders visible to everyone are imported. Drafts and folders for logged-in users, agents or specific companies are never imported, even if the API key has access to them.
  • Always up to date. The source resyncs on its own at your plan’s frequency: weekly on Standard and daily on Premium (see Automatic sync). Later syncs only reprocess the articles that changed, and articles you delete in Freshdesk stop being used.
  • Public links. When the agent shares an article, it uses the link from the public Freshdesk portal.
  • One language. Your knowledge base’s main language is imported; the agent still answers in the language the visitor writes in.
  • One source per agent. To change the filter, open the source again and click Save and sync again.
  • In All sources, you can filter by the Freshdesk type to see only this source.

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Pause or disconnect

In My agents → [your agent] → Integrations, the ··· menu on the Freshdesk row has Test connection, Replace key, and Disconnect, and the Active switch pauses the integration:
  • Pausing keeps the connection. While it’s paused, the Action can’t call Freshdesk and the source stops syncing, but content already imported is still used to answer. See Pause an integration.
  • Disconnecting deletes the API key from ChatNorris. Before you confirm, ChatNorris shows you what depends on the connection. The Freshdesk Tickets Action is disabled and keeps its configuration, and the knowledge source is deactivated but not deleted. To use them again, connect Freshdesk again and reactivate them.

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Frequently asked questions

No. There can be only one Freshdesk Tickets Action per agent, and each agent supports only one Freshdesk connection. If you need different configurations or accounts, use separate agents.
The API key belongs to a Freshdesk agent, and that agent is the one who signs the tickets. That’s why we recommend a dedicated agent, for example “ChatNorris”. The ticket’s requester is the visitor, with the name and email they wrote in the chat.
Still enter your .freshdesk.com subdomain when connecting. You’ll find it in Freshdesk, in Admin → Portals.
Only published articles from folders visible to everyone are imported. Check that the article isn’t a draft and that its folder isn’t limited to logged-in users, agents or specific companies. If you chose categories and folders, also check that the article is in one of them.