Internal notes vs client messages
Each client's Messages tab has two ways to write:
- Email goes to the client's inbox. Their replies come back into the same conversation.
- Internal note is for your team only. It stays in the conversation for context but never goes to the client.
Switch between them at the top of the composer. The conversation shows both, styled differently, so everyone at the agency can tell what the client can see.
Limits on client email
Every agency's client email goes out from Phloz's own email domain, so a few rules keep it trusted. Each one says what to do if it gets in your way. Questions about any of them? Write to contact@phloz.com.
- Links Phloz never sends to clients. Shortened links (bit.ly, TinyURL and the like; Google Maps share links from maps.app.goo.gl are fine), links to a bare IP address, links with a name or password before the address, and addresses made to look like a well-known company's site when they aren't. To fix: paste the full link, use the site's name instead of its IP address, and share logins separately. If a refused link is your site or your client's, write to us and we'll allow it for your workspace.
- A new workspace's first 24 hours. Client email (messages, task updates and portal sign-in links, including one a client asks for on the sign-in page) goes only to your own team's confirmed addresses, so you can try it all on yourself. Adding clients and everything else works as usual. To fix: nothing to do; Phloz shows the exact time it ends.
- A confirmed owner. Until the workspace owner confirms their email address, client email reaches only your team, and clients signed out of their portal can't get a new portal sign-in link either. To fix: click the link in the confirmation email, or use Send the link again on the banner.
- New people per day in the first 30 days. A workspace on the free plan can email 20 new people a day, and one on a trial, or in its first 7 days of paying, 50; each person can email 50 new people a day across all their workspaces. Emails to someone you've written to in the last 24 hours don't count again, and neither does a sign-in link a client who has signed in before asks for on the portal's sign-in page. Turning on portal access counts the contact as a new person. All new workspaces together also share a daily limit on emailing new people; if it's reached, the message says when you can email someone new again. A reply's heads-up to the conversation's other client contacts counts like any other email to them. The limit ends once you've paid for a plan (a trial doesn't count) or the workspace is 30 days old. To fix: the message says when you can email someone new again; to lift the limit sooner, write to us.
- A few more link checks in the first 30 days. In the same period, Phloz also refuses an email that names a well-known consumer brand (a bank or payment app, a delivery service, a marketplace, a file-sharing or e-signature service) and has a link, and a link to a free website host, shared folder or online form next to account-alarm wording ("verify your account", "unusual activity", "your account has been suspended"), because phishing looks exactly like that. To fix: reword it, or write to us and we'll take a look.
- Sender names. A workspace, agency or display name can't include "Phloz", a word that reads like an email system ("Postmaster", "Mail Delivery", "No-reply"), a web address or a phone number. A name that reads like a well-known company's own staff ("PayPal Support", say) holds client email (including portal sign-in links). To fix: rename it in your agency's own words ("Acme, Shopify Partners"; for a consumer brand like PayPal, leave the brand out) and client email goes out again right away, or, if the name really is your agency's, write to us and we'll review it. A display name that reads like a company's own (a bank's or a carrier's, say) is left out of the From line, which then shows just your agency's name.
- Spam reports and bounces. If people mark your client email as spam, or many emails bounce off addresses that don't exist, the client email your team writes can pause while we take a look. The owner gets an email saying so; your team's own email, the client portal, intake forms and invitations keep working. A contact who marks an automatic update as spam simply stops getting updates. To fix: reply to that email or write to us; we reply within one business day.
Client email ends with "Sent by Phloz on behalf of (your agency). Not expecting this email? Report it: phloz.com/report-abuse", so a stranger who gets an email they didn't expect can tell us. The line stays until all three hold: the workspace is paying, it is at least 30 days old, and "Remove ‘Powered by Phloz’ from the portal" is turned on in Settings → Branding. That setting is on Business and above, so on other plans the line always shows.
How clients reply
Two ways, both work today:
- Reply to an email Phloz sent. Email you send from Phloz comes from Phloz's address (no-reply@phloz.com), with your name and your agency's name as the sender. When the client clicks Reply, their answer comes back into Phloz, in the same conversation.
- Reply through the client portal. If you've turned on portal access for their contact, the client signs in with an emailed link (it works once, for 60 minutes, and keeps them signed in for 30 days) and can reply to any conversation they can see or start a new one. Their reply lands in the same conversation, under the contact's name.
Either way, the reply appears as a message from the client; a small icon shows whether it came by email or through the portal. Who gets an email about it depends on each teammate's notification settings.
Clients can also write to their forwarding address any time, no portal link needed. Copy it from the top of the client's Messages tab and share it. A new email from one of the client's contacts there can become a request (see Client requests); an automatic reply is marked Auto-reply.
@-mentions
Type @ in a task comment, an internal note or a client email, and a list of teammates pops up; pick one to add their name. They're notified. In a client email, the client just sees the teammate's name.
The Mentions page shows every place you've been tagged, across tasks and messages. The sidebar badge counts new mentions since you last opened it.
In the client portal, a contact can @-mention a colleague too. Phloz emails the colleague only when they have portal access, and not when the message has a link Phloz doesn't send to clients; the portal tells the contact when that happens.
Inbox keyboard shortcuts
In the Messages inbox:
- j / k move through the messages in the list.
- Enter opens that message's conversation.
- ? opens the keyboard-shortcuts sheet from anywhere.
Reply drafts save themselves
What you type is saved in this browser a moment after you stop typing, separately for each conversation and for Email or Internal note. Closing the tab won't lose it. Sending clears it, and a restored draft has a Clear link.