Understanding Email Recipient Indicators
When replying to a ticket, support representatives may need to include additional recipients in the To or Cc fields. However, adding recipients whose email domains differ from the ticket contact's domain can expose customer information to unintended parties.
Email Recipient settings identify recipients whose email domains differ from the ticket contact's email domain. Agents can view these recipients through color-coded recipient chips and an alert displayed when sending a reply containing non-domain recipients.
Note: Email Recipient Indicator is supported only for the following DCs - UK, SG, CA, UAE, SA, CN, JP, AU.
Availability
Permission Required Users with SupportAdministrator permission in their profile can configure Email recipient indicators settings separately for each department.
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Understanding Email Recipient Indicator
Email Recipient Indicator helps support agents identify recipients whose email domains differ from the ticket contact's domain. It highlights non-domain recipients while composing a reply and displays an alert before sending an email, helping agents verify external recipients and avoid unintended email disclosures.
Email Recipient settings provide two controls:
1. Highlight Non-Domain Recipients
This setting highlights recipient chips whose email domains differ from the ticket contact's domain.
The visual distinction helps support representatives identify external recipients while composing a reply and review the recipient list before sending it.
For example a customer submits a ticket using alex@zylker.com. While replying, an agent adds john@gmail.com in the Cc field. Zoho Desk highlights John's recipient chip to distinguish it from recipients using the zylker.com domain.
2. Non-Domain Recipients Alert
This setting displays an alert when an agent sends a reply containing one or more non-domain recipients.
The alert provides an additional opportunity for representatives to review the recipient list and confirm that the external addresses are intended recipients.
For example an agent replies to a customer's ticket and includes john@gmail.com and support@partner.com in the recipient list.
Before the reply is sent, Zoho Desk displays an alert indicating "This email reply includes recipients that aren't part of the Ticket Contact's domain and have been highlighted for reference".
The agent can review the recipients before proceeding.
Note:
- Recipient highlighting helps representatives identify external addresses while composing a reply, whereas the alert provides an additional review point when sending it.
Business scenario
Identify external recipients in customer conversations
A customer, Alex (alex@zylker.com), raises a ticket with a software provider reporting an issue with their CRM integration. The support agent investigates the issue and needs to share the troubleshooting steps with the customer's external implementation consultant.
The agent adds the consultant's email address, consultant@partner.com, in the Cc field while replying to Alex.
Since the consultant's email domain (partner.com) differs from the ticket contact's domain (zylker.com), Zoho Desk identifies the consultant as a non-domain recipient and highlights the recipient chip.
Recipient | Email domain | Identification |
Alex | zylker.com | Matches the ticket contact's domain |
Sam | zylker.com | Matches the ticket contact's domain |
John | gmail.com | Non-domain recipient |
David | partners.com | Non-domain recipient |
In this example, John and David are identified as non-domain recipients because their email domains differ from the ticket contact's domain.
Review recipients in warranty-related conversations
An equipment manufacturer manages warranty requests through Zoho Desk. Support representatives frequently coordinate with regional service centers to resolve customer issues.
A customer submits a warranty request using customer@example.com. The agent adds service@regionalcenter.com to the reply to coordinate an inspection.
Since the service center uses a different email domain, Zoho Desk identifies it as a non-domain recipient. If the alert is enabled, the agent also gets an opportunity to review the recipient list before sending the update.
Verify vendor recipients in property-management requests
A property-management company handles maintenance requests from tenants and coordinates repairs with external vendors.
A tenant submits a maintenance request using tenant@zylker.com. The support agent adds repairs@vendor.com to the conversation to coordinate a repair appointment.
The recipient indicator distinguishes the vendor's email address from the tenant's address. This helps the agent review the recipient list before sharing maintenance updates or scheduling information.
Ticket-Level Color Persistence
Recipient colors are assigned at the ticket level and remain consistent for the same external domain across subsequent replies in a ticket conversation.
For example, if partner.com is assigned a particular color in Ticket A, the same color is retained whenever recipients from that domain appear in subsequent replies within Ticket A.
However, color assignments are not maintained across the organization or between different tickets. The same domain may appear in a different color in Ticket B.
Note:
- Color variations across tickets do not affect recipient identification or email delivery.
Customize Recipient Chip Appearance
Recipient chips support different appearance preferences that control the visual style of highlighted non-domain recipients.
The available appearance preferences are:
Preference | Appearance |
Minimal | Displays non-domain recipients with a minimal color treatment. Colored text can also be applied. |
Subtle | Displays non-domain recipients with a light-colored background. Colored text can also be applied. |
Bold | Displays non-domain recipients with a higher-contrast background. The recipient text uses a predefined contrasting color, so a separate colored-text option is unavailable. |
These preferences change the visual presentation of recipient chips, not the criteria used to identify non-domain recipients.
To customize the visual style of non-domain recipient chips:
- Click the My Information (profile image in the top-right corner)
- Navigate to Preferences > Accessibility Controls.
- Locate the Select style for colored picklists.
- Select the required display style:
- Minimal: Displays recipient chips with a minimal color treatment.
- Subtle: Displays recipient chips with a light-colored background.
- Bold: Displays recipient chips with a higher-contrast background.
Note:
- Select Do not apply colour to text to prevent the assigned color from being applied to the recipient text.
- This changes the text appearance while retaining the recipient chip's background color. Do not apply colour to text is available only under Subtle and Minimal colored picklists style.
Configure Email Recipient Settings
An admin can configure Email Recipient settings separately for each department.
To configure recipient highlighting and alerts:
- Navigate to Setup > Privacy and Security > Email Recipient.
- Next to Highlight Non-Domain Recipients, click Configure.
- Click Edit Configuration.
- Click Add Departments and select the required departments.
- Next to Non-Domain Recipients Alert, click Configure.
- Click Edit Configuration.
- Click Add Departments and select the required departments.
Once configured, support representatives can identify non-domain recipients through highlighted recipient chips and, when enabled, review an alert before sending replies.
Points to remember
- Email Recipient settings are configured separately for each department.
- A recipient is identified as a non-domain recipient when their email domain differs from the ticket contact's email domain.
- Recipient highlighting and the non-domain recipient alert are separate controls.
- The same external domain retains its assigned color within an individual ticket conversation.
- Color assignments are not shared across different tickets.
- The Minimal and Subtle appearance preferences support colored recipient text.
- The Bold appearance preference uses predefined contrasting text, so a separate colored-text option is unavailable.
- Recipient indicators help support representatives review the recipient list but do not independently verify whether an external recipient is authorized to receive customer information.
- Different recipient domains may be assigned the same color within a ticket conversation if their generated hash values are identical.
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