Each department can have its own email address, assigned staff, and notification rules — making it easier to manage incoming support requests efficiently.
1. Department Email (IMAP)
Each department can be configured with its own email address under
Setup → Service → Departments.
This email serves a specific purpose:
It’s used for email piping, which means that any message sent to that address will automatically create a new support ticket in ClearCRM.
It does not send notifications about new or updated tickets.
👉 Important: The department’s IMAP inbox is an input channel, not a notification sender.
If you expect to receive alerts about ticket creation, that depends on team member assignments, not the IMAP address itself.
2. Assigning Team Members to Departments
To ensure that your staff receives ticket-related notifications, each relevant team member must be assigned to the appropriate department.
Here’s how:
Go to Setup → Team → Team Members.
Click on the name of a team member.
Scroll down to the Member Departments section.
Check the box(es) next to the department(s) they should belong to.
Click Save.
Once assigned:
The staff member will receive notifications when a new ticket is created in their department (depending on email notification settings).
They will also see tickets from that department in their ticket list.
3. Testing the Setup
To confirm that everything is configured correctly:
Create or open a test department.
Assign at least one staff member to it.
Create a test support ticket and assign it to the department.
Check that the assigned staff receives the email notification.
Verify that the IMAP mailbox remains inactive unless someone sends a message to it (which would then generate a new ticket).
4. Common Misunderstandings
The department’s IMAP email does not receive notifications — it only listens for incoming messages.
If no staff are assigned to a department, no one will be notified when a new ticket is created.
Staff assignment is handled per team member, not from the Departments setup page.
Example Scenario
A customer sends an email to [email protected].
That email is piped into ClearCRM and automatically creates a new ticket under the Support department.
If Alice and Bob are assigned to the Support department in their Team Member profiles, both will receive an email notification about the new ticket.
The mailbox [email protected] itself will not receive a separate alert — its job is simply to forward that email into the ticketing system.