Support that keeps answering after you log off.

A small store's busiest chat hours are often the ones nobody is at a desk for: evenings, weekends, the hour after a sale email goes out. A night shift costs more than most stores can carry. A "we're offline, leave a message" form loses the shopper who wanted an answer now.

The middle path is an AI agent that answers what it can at any hour, and hands the rest to your team in a way that doesn't feel like a dead end. Here is how that works in Aide, and what to set up.

What gets answered overnight

Aide works the same at 3 AM as at noon, on Aide Chat (your Shopify storefront, website or hosted chat page) and on your support email. It replies straight away, unless you set a quiet period.

Take a typical Thursday night:

• 11:40 PM. A shopper asks where order #3318 is. Aide checks the UPS scan, sees the parcel is out for delivery, and says so.
• 12:05 AM. Someone placed order #3321 an hour ago with an old address. Aide verifies the shopper, updates the address in Shopify, and confirms the change.
• 12:30 AM. A visitor asks whether the linen shirt comes in navy. Aide answers from the product's real options and stock, and shows a product card they can add to the cart.
• 1:15 AM. A shopper writes that their order arrived damaged and wants a replacement. Replacements are your team's call, so Aide hands the conversation over and asks for an email.

Tracking comes directly from UPS and FedEx, and from Shopify for other carriers such as USPS, including every package of a split order. Policy questions are answered from your website, help center and the articles you write. Order changes need the shopper to prove the order is theirs first. When Aide doesn't know something, it says so and offers your team instead of guessing.

When a shopper needs a person

You choose what happens outside business hours. There are two options:

1. Aide keeps handling. It answers as usual all night. A conversation that needs a person gets your outside-hours message and a request for the shopper's email.
2. Aide acknowledges and pauses. It posts the outside-hours message, asks for an email, and waits for your team to open.

Most small stores choose the first, because it is the one that answers the shopper who wants tracking at midnight. The second suits stores that want a person on every conversation.

The outside-hours message is yours to write. Aide fills in your team name and the next reply time, so the shopper reads: "Thanks, the Acme team will reply tomorrow at 9:00 AM." A shopper who taps "Talk to a person", or writes only to ask for one, is handed off at once without Aide answering first.

Following up by email

A shopper at midnight won't keep a tab open for your 9 AM reply, so the reply goes to their inbox. Aide Chat can ask for an email after Aide's first reply, before the chat starts, or only at a handoff. Once the shopper gives it, a fixed confirmation tells them your team will reply to that address even if they close the chat. That confirmation is not an AI reply and is never billed.

In the morning, your teammate replies in the chat as usual. If the shopper hasn't read it within 15 minutes, or about a minute after they close the chat, the reply is emailed to them. When they answer the email, it lands back in the same conversation, so nobody has to piece the story together.

Hours, SLAs and quiet nights

One business-hours schedule, with your timezone, weekly hours and holidays, drives three things:

• Handoffs. It decides when the outside-hours message applies.
• SLA policies. A policy set to business hours counts only open hours, so the weekend a Friday-night conversation waits through doesn't count against your first-response target.
• Notifications. Each type, such as a handoff or an order waiting for approval, can email always or only outside hours. Slack alerts can go to a shared channel too. Neither includes the customer's message or email address.

Refunds wait for a teammate by default, and the "Order action needs approval" email goes out after hours by default. A refund a shopper asked for at 2 AM is in front of your team when it logs on, ready to approve or reject.

Setting it up

1. Install Aide and switch on Aide Chat on your storefront, or paste the snippet on your website.
2. Forward your support address to Aide, or connect your Gmail inbox.
3. Set your business hours, timezone and holidays.
4. Pick what happens when no one is online, and write your outside-hours message.
5. Choose when Aide Chat asks for an email.
6. Decide which topics Aide may act on alone. Order tracking is the usual first one; the ticket-type guide walks through it.