Customer requests: intake, triage, routing and updates

Last checked 2026-11-13

Short answer: Resident requests such as potholes, missed bins, overgrown blocks and noise complaints arrive by email, web form and phone, and most of the handling is administrative. An AI worker can read each request, log it, suggest a category and team, draft an acknowledgement and chase overdue items. Officers decide priority, inspect, respond to complaints and handle anything involving risk to a person.

Customer request handling has no single national rule in Australia or the US. Service standards are set by each council or agency. This page describes the pattern generically. Your own service charter sets the timeframes.

On this page

Intake and triage
Routing to the right team
Keeping residents updated
What stays with a person
If you already have a CRM

Intake and triage

Smaller councils often take requests into a shared mailbox and track them in a spreadsheet or SharePoint list. An AI worker that reads that mailbox can:

Pull out the details that matter: who, where, what, any photos, and how the resident wants to be contacted.
Suggest a request type from your own category list, and say when it isn't sure.
Log the request in the register with a reference number and a target date from your service standard.
Spot likely duplicates, such as several residents reporting the same fallen tree, and link them for an officer to confirm.
Flag anything that suggests urgency or risk, such as a hazard on a road or a threat, so an officer sees it immediately. These flags go to a person. The AI does not decide priority alone.

Routing to the right team

Routing rules come from your organisation: which team handles which request type, in which area, and who covers when someone is away. Written down, those rules let the AI assign a request to a team's queue or a Planner board, and post a note in that team's Teams channel. Requests it can't place go to a coordinator, not to a guess.

Each morning the AI can send a summary of open requests by team, items close to their target date, and anything waiting on a resident. The Everything's morning brief in Teams works this way.

Keeping residents updated

Residents mostly want to know that their request was received and what happens next. The AI can draft an acknowledgement with the reference number and expected timeframe. It can also draft an update when the request changes status, and a closing message when the work is done. Officers approve before anything goes out. The Everything says it asks before anything important goes out. For messages to the public, confirm during a trial that it waits for an officer each time.

For overdue requests, the AI can remind the responsible officer and draft a holding reply to the resident. That stops the follow-up email from becoming a complaint.

What stays with a person

Priority, especially for anything involving safety, vulnerability or risk to a person.
Site inspections, enforcement decisions and any regulatory action.
Complaints about the council or its staff, and their responses.
Calls and conversations. The Everything's phone assistant is not a live product, so phone requests still need a person to take them, after which the AI can log and route them.

If you already have a CRM

Larger councils often run a dedicated customer request system, sometimes part of a wider platform such as TechnologyOne or Granicus. In that case an AI worker on Microsoft 365 is unlikely to replace it. It may help with the email side of the work around it. Those platforms are not on The Everything's published integrations list. Ask the vendor before assuming a connection exists.

Requests that turn into applications are covered on the permits and licences and development applications pages. Before using AI on residents' personal information, read what to check before you start.

Questions people ask

Can an AI close a customer request?

It can draft the closing message and update the register once an officer confirms the work is done. Closing without that confirmation would mean telling a resident something nobody has checked.

Who sets the response timeframes?

Your council or agency, through its service charter or customer service standards. No single national rule applies, so the AI works from the targets you give it.

Can it take phone requests?

Not by answering calls. The Everything's AI phone assistant is on its roadmap and is not available. An officer takes the call and the AI can log and route the request from their notes.

Will it categorise requests correctly every time?

No tool will. Use your own category list, have it say when it is unsure, and send uncertain items to a coordinator. Review a sample of its categorisations early on.

Does it work without a CRM?

Yes. That is the case it suits best: a shared mailbox, a SharePoint list or Excel register, and Teams for the officers.

An AI worker inside Microsoft 365

The Everything runs inside Microsoft 365 and Teams. It prepares, checks, tracks and drafts, and it asks before anything important goes out. There is a 14-day free trial with no credit card. After that it costs $400 AUD/month + GST per organisation, with unlimited team members. Do your own security, privacy and records assessment before using it for government work.

See how The Everything works