Overview
The Triage tab is the first stop in the Dispatch HQ workflow and is primarily used by dispatchers. While service managers and administrators may also have access, the day-to-day responsibility of reviewing and confirming tickets in this tab typically belongs to whoever on your team owns the dispatching function.
As a dispatcher, the Triage tab is your intake queue. Every service request that comes in, whether through email, phone, a client portal, or any other channel, appears here first, waiting to be reviewed and classified before it is ready to be worked by your technician team.
Rather than relying on memory or manually monitoring your PSA queue, the Triage tab gives you a single, centralized place to see exactly what needs attention. Dispatch HQ's AI analyzes each incoming ticket and suggests classification values so you are not starting from scratch on every single ticket, even on high-volume days or when coverage is thin.
The goal of the Triage tab is simple: get every incoming ticket properly classified and into the dispatch queue as efficiently and consistently as possible, regardless of who is doing the triaging that day.
Managing Your Triage Queue
The Triage tab displays all tickets currently awaiting review in the order they arrived. Depending on your account configuration and ticket volume, this queue may contain anywhere from a handful of tickets to a large backlog, particularly when Dispatch HQ is first enabled and your historical tickets are synced for the first time.
Each ticket must be reviewed and confirmed individually to ensure the AI suggestions are verified before a ticket moves forward in the workflow. This is intentional: the review step is where quality control happens, and batch-confirming tickets without review would defeat the purpose of triage.
If you are dealing with a large backlog when first getting started, prioritize tickets that are time-sensitive or approaching SLA thresholds first. Those will have the most immediate impact once they reach the Unassigned tab.
Reviewing a Ticket
When you are ready to work through your triage queue, locate a ticket and select the Review Ticket button. This opens a review panel where you can see the ticket's current settings alongside AI-generated suggestions.
What You'll See
On one side of the review panel, you will find the ticket's current information as it came in, including the summary or description submitted by the client and any fields that were pre-populated at creation.
On the other side, Dispatch HQ surfaces AI-recommended values for the fields that are most critical to triage. These include:
ConnectWise
Service Board — The board within your PSA that the ticket belongs to, which determines how it flows through Dispatch HQ.
Type — The broad category of the issue, such as Hardware, Software, or Network.
Subtype — A more specific classification within the Type, such as Desktop, Application, or Connectivity.
Item — The specific element involved, such as a particular application, device, or component.
Priority — The urgency level assigned to the ticket, which directly influences how it will be ranked in the Unassigned tab once confirmed.
Status — The current state of the ticket, which determines which queue it belongs to once it moves out of Triage.
Agreement — The service agreement associated with the client, which ensures the ticket is billed and tracked correctly.
Budget Hours — The estimated hours allocated to resolve the ticket, used to manage capacity and client expectations.
Autotask
Queue — The queue the ticket belongs to, which determines how it flows through Dispatch HQ.
Issue Type — The broad category of the issue.
Sub-Issue Type — A more specific classification within the Issue Type.
Priority — The urgency level assigned to the ticket, which directly influences how it will be ranked in the Unassigned tab once confirmed.
Status — The current state of the ticket, which determines which queue it belongs to once it moves out of Triage.
Contract — The service contract associated with the client, which ensures the ticket is billed and tracked correctly.
Estimated Hours — The estimated hours allocated to resolve the ticket, used to manage capacity and client expectations.
HaloPSA
Ticket Type — The category of the issue, which determines how it flows through Dispatch HQ.
Status — The current state of the ticket, which determines which queue it belongs to once it moves out of Triage.
Priority — The urgency level assigned to the ticket, which directly influences how it will be ranked in the Unassigned tab once confirmed.
These suggestions are based on the AI's analysis of the ticket's content cross-referenced against your organization's historical ticket data. The more tickets your team processes through Dispatch HQ, the more accurate and relevant those suggestions become over time.
Reviewing and Applying Suggestions
Once you see the AI suggestions, you have full control over what gets applied. You can accept the recommended values as-is, adjust them if something looks off, or override them entirely based on your own judgment. The dispatcher is always in the decision seat. The AI is there to reduce the manual effort and cognitive load of triaging dozens or hundreds of tickets a day, not to replace your expertise.
This is especially valuable when ticket volume spikes or when coverage is thin. Even if a less experienced team member has to step in, the AI suggestions provide a consistent baseline so triage quality does not degrade.
Tickets that are not confirmed will remain in the Triage tab indefinitely until a dispatcher takes action on them. There is no automatic timeout, expiration, or escalation that moves a ticket out of Triage on its own. This means that if a ticket sits unreviewed, it will not move into the Unassigned tab and will not be available for technicians to pull.
For this reason, it is important to work through your Triage queue regularly, particularly during high-volume periods when new tickets can accumulate quickly.
If the AI cannot confidently suggest values for a ticket, the fields will either be left blank or flagged for your review. In these cases, you can enter the values manually based on your own assessment of the ticket. The AI suggestion is a starting point, not a requirement, and you always have the ability to override or fill in any field yourself before confirming.
Confirming a Ticket
Once you have reviewed the ticket settings and are satisfied with the classifications, confirm the ticket to complete triage. At that point, the ticket moves off the Triage tab and appears in the Unassigned tab, where it becomes available for a technician to pull and begin working.
Confirmed tickets will no longer appear in your triage queue, keeping your Triage tab focused only on what still needs your attention.
Note: If you need to review a ticket's full history or make changes outside of the triage flow, you can access it directly from your PSA. The Triage tab in Dispatch HQ is specifically scoped to the triage stage of the workflow.