Short answer
In Aide each topic, such as order tracking or refunds, has its own AI level, so tracking can run on its own while refunds wait for your team. New topics start at Drafts, and you see which real conversations a rule matches before switching it on.- AI levels
- AI Agent acts alone, Drafts waits for a person, None leaves actions to your team.
- New topics
- Start at Drafts, and stay there until your team moves them.
- Refunds
- Wait for a teammate on every topic until you raise Aide's limits.
- Confidence
- A scenario can require 80% to 97.5% topic confidence.
- Match preview
- Real conversations from the last 28 days, with Aide's draft on each.
- Plans
- Every plan, Free included.
Most support teams don't want an AI answering everything on day one, and they shouldn't. "Where is my order?" is a lookup with a right answer sitting in Shopify. "I want a refund for the third time this year" is a judgment call. Treat them the same and you either waste the easy wins or take on the risky ones.
Aide automates one type of request at a time. You decide per topic how far it goes, and you move a topic up only after your team has watched it get things right.
How Aide sorts tickets into topics
Every customer message, on chat, email or a helpdesk ticket, is matched against your own topics: "Order tracking", "Refund request", "Address change", whatever your team actually handles. Aide scores each topic on its name, its description and the example messages your team saves to it. It picks up to three, best first, or none.
You don't need the full list on day one. When no topic fits a message, Aide proposes one right on the message, with a name, a group and a one-line description. Your topics grow out of real conversations instead of a planning document.
Three AI levels, set per topic
Each topic is set to one of three levels:
- AI Agent. Aide acts within the scenarios that match the topic, without waiting for a person.
- Drafts. Aide proposes replies and actions, and a person confirms them. Every new topic starts here.
- None. In Zendesk, Gorgias and Front, Aide writes no drafts on these tickets. In chat and email it still answers from your knowledge, and leaves anything it would have to do or promise to your team.
A common starting point for a Shopify store:
| Topic | Level | What happens |
|---|---|---|
| Order tracking | AI Agent | Aide answers with live tracking for verified shoppers |
| Address change | Drafts | Aide offers the change, a teammate approves it |
| Refund request | Drafts | Aide offers the refund, a teammate approves it before money moves |
| Product complaint | None | Aide answers from knowledge in chat and hands the rest to your team |
Refunds have their own limits
The AI level isn't the only gate on money. Every refund Aide offers, including one that comes with a cancellation, is checked against three limits:
- an amount per refund, which starts at $0, so nothing refunds on its own
- a share of the order total, off by default
- a total for Aide's refunds over 24 hours
A refund above any of them waits for a teammate, whatever the topic's level. A refund above your approval threshold needs an Owner or Admin. You can also switch individual order actions off entirely, such as cancelling or removing an unshipped item. And every order action starts with the shopper proving the order is theirs.
Scenarios: what each topic does
A topic's level says how far Aide may go. A scenario says what it should do when a conversation matches. Conditions can combine:
- the topic: detected, the top topic, or a priority topic
- a minimum topic confidence, from 80% to 97.5% in 2.5% steps
- Shopify facts: an order exists, tracking exists, the shipment is in transit or delivered, the destination country
- conversation facts: first message, tag, inbox, helpdesk, ticket and customer fields
Actions include instructions for Aide's reply, a fixed reply with order details filled in, collecting a field, tagging, assigning, an internal note, running a macro, or a handoff to your team.
For example: on "Order tracking", when the shipment is delivered and the order is more than 14 days old, assign to the Claims team with an internal note. Everything else on that topic, Aide answers.
While you edit the conditions, Aide shows a count such as "About 120 conversations in the last 28 days match", with up to five real examples. Owners and admins can preview the reply Aide would write on any of them, or see why it would hand off, before the scenario is switched on.
One thing to know: a scenario that has Aide write the reply lets Aide act as it would on an AI Agent topic, for that message. It still offers only the order changes the scenario names, and refund limits still apply. Use that kind of scenario on topics you are ready to automate.
Graduate one topic at a time
- Let Aide suggest topics as conversations arrive, then tidy the list.
- Pick the busiest, lowest-risk topic. For most stores that is order tracking.
- Leave it on Drafts for a week and read what Aide proposes.
- Write a scenario, check its match count and preview drafts on real conversations.
- Move the topic to AI Agent. On a connected helpdesk, widen the inbox's rollout in stages, as the helpdesk guide explains.
- Pick the next topic.