Help agents quickly get up to speed with case, customer, and Special Handling Notes context in one card, along with a shortcut to agentic actions
Case Insights is the section on the case record page that brings generated case context to agents the moment they open a record. It replaces the previous Case Summarization component and expands on it: the card is built from four things working together, three generative AI skills, Case summarization, Customer summarization, and Special handling notes, plus the Ask AI button as a direct shortcut into the Provide Customer 360 Insights agentic workflow, so agents get the reported issue, account context, flagged notes, and a path to deeper follow-up without leaving the case or reading the full activity feed.
This is especially valuable during escalations, handoffs, or when returning to older cases.
Composable by design: Case Insights is four things, not one. Case summarization, Customer summarization, and Special handling notes are three separate skills, turn on one, two, or all three, whatever your rollout needs. The fourth piece is Ask AI, a shortcut button that connects agents directly to the Provide Customer 360 Insights agentic workflow for multi-turn, conversational follow-up in the Otto Panel. The Case Insights card only renders what's active, so there is no wrong order to enable these in.
Key Capabilities
- Case summary: Generates a summary of the reported issue, actions taken, and SLA status, with a trending topic banner when applicable. Draws from the activity stream and case fields; no hard minimum length, though richer context improves quality.
- Customer summary: Surfaces lifetime value, plan type, average handling time, and CSAT score, plus recent case and interaction counts and links to navigate to all of them, without leaving the case.
- Special handling notes: Displays notes flagged on the account or case, such as VIP status or compliance requirements, in the same card agents already check.
- Ask AI, the fourth piece: A shortcut button that opens the Otto Panel and triggers the Provide Customer 360 Insights agentic workflow. Agents can select Ask AI directly for a general summary, or choose a preset question, Identify potential root cause, Recommend resolution steps, Show similar resolved cases, or Show similar open issues, and continue asking follow-ups in the panel. Visible only when that agentic workflow is enabled.
- Generate on open or on demand: Now Assist checks if there's enough case information to summarize. If automatic triggering is on, the summary generates when the case opens; otherwise agents select Summarize.
- Feedback, copy, expand and collapse: Agents can rate any summary with thumbs-up or thumbs-down, copy the case summary to the clipboard, and expand or collapse the card. Collapsed is the default state on the record form.
- Extendable to other tables: Admins can duplicate the Case summarization skill to tailor it for extended table inputs, such as Case Types.
Implementation Steps
Each of the three skills turns on independently from Now Assist Admin > Skills > Customer workflow. Ask AI, the fourth piece, becomes available once at least one skill is active. Start with the skill or skills that match your rollout, then layer in the rest when ready. Full setup steps are in the docs below.
- Use the Case Summarization skill
- Configure Customer summarization
- Special handling notes: overview
- Configure special handling notes
- Configure Special handling notes summarization
- Customize Case Insights Ask AI button system properties
- CSM AI Agent Collection: Provide Customer 360 Insights agentic workflow
For Case Types, input/output modifications, and grounding in your use case, follow this video:
Best Practices
- Roll out in whatever order fits your data: If customer account data (lifetime value, CSAT) isn't clean yet, start with Case summarization alone and add Customer summarization once that data is reliable.
- Give the case enough to work with: Although there is no minimum character count, include at least 200 words of context in the case to enable high-quality case summaries.
- Separate user access from role restrictions: For Customer summarization, user access controls who can trigger the skill; role restrictions control what data it can reach. Set both deliberately, not just one.
- Keep special handling notes lean: Avoid more than 10,000 active notes on an instance, and avoid complex conditions or heavy dot-walking, since both can affect load time.
- Always validate before acting: Train agents to review and confirm any generated summary, customer detail, or note before copying it to work notes or resolving a case.
- Use cloning for exceptions, not defaults: Clone a skill through Skill Kit for edge cases like extended Case Types or removing a section, rather than changing base behavior for everyone.
- Test Ask AI after any change: After adjusting the Ask AI system properties, verify the updated drop-down and quick questions appear as expected in CSM Configurable Workspace.
- Watch feedback across all active skills: Now Assist Analytics reports thumbs-up and thumbs-down by skill; use it to catch a drop in quality on any one of the three before agents stop trusting the card.
Formal Learning
- SNU: ServiceNow Otto for CSM Essentials Path
- SNU: ServiceNow Otto for CSM Acceleration Bundle: Summarization & Generation
Measured Success & Outcomes
| Skill | Outcome | Value to Agents | Key Metric |
|---|---|---|---|
| Case summarization | Faster onboarding to a case | Reduces time to understand complex or escalated cases without reading the full activity stream | Time to summary per case |
| Case summarization | Consistent handoffs | Ensures clarity when cases change ownership | % of cases with a generated summary |
| Customer summarization | Faster account context | Surfaces lifetime value, plan type, CSAT, and recent history without navigating to the account record | Agent time saved per case |
| Customer summarization | Better-informed conversations | Agents open every interaction already knowing account value and history | Customer summary view rate |
| Special handling notes | Fewer missed alerts | Special handling notes appear in the same card agents already check, reducing missed VIP or compliance flags | Special handling notes acknowledgment rate |
| Ask AI / Customer 360 | Deeper self-service resolution | Agents get targeted answers (root cause, resolution steps, similar cases) without switching tools | Ask AI engagement rate; follow-up questions per session |
| All four (Case Insights card) | Quality monitoring | Helps managers audit summaries and notes via feedback history | Feedback scores (positive vs negative) across active skills |
FAQs
Q. Is Case Insights one skill or three?
Neither. It's a card built from four things: three separate skills, Case summarization, Customer summarization, and Special handling notes, plus Ask AI, a shortcut into the Provide Customer 360 Insights agentic workflow. Each skill is turned on independently, and the card only renders sections for whichever are active.
Q. Do I need to activate all three skills to use the card?
No. Activate one, two, or all three. A single-skill rollout works fine, and you can add the rest later without disrupting what's already live.
Q. Where does Case Insights appear?
On the CSM default record page and front-line record page in CSM Configurable Workspace version 26.1.1 and later. In version 26.1.0 and earlier, the equivalent component is Case summary.
Q. Can any of the generated content be edited directly?
Not directly. Agents can copy a case summary into work notes or comments and edit it there.
Q. When does the Ask AI button appear, and what does it do?
It appears only when the Provide Customer 360 Insights agentic workflow is enabled, even if one or more of the three summarization skills are active. Selecting Ask AI directly opens the Otto Panel and returns a general case summary. Selecting a preset question from the drop-down, Identify potential root cause, Recommend resolution steps, Show similar resolved cases, or Show similar open issues, returns a response specific to that question. Agents can ask follow-ups either way.
Q. Can we control which questions show up in Ask AI?
Yes. Two system properties, sn_csm_gen_ai.ask_ai_dropdown_questions and sn_csm_gen_ai.ask_ai_quick_questions, control the drop-down and quick questions. At least one of the three summarization skills must be active to configure them.
Q. How many special handling notes can we have before it affects performance?
Keep it under 10,000 active notes on an instance, and avoid complex conditions or heavy dot-walking when creating them.
Q. Does this require UI customization?
No. The card and buttons are available out of the box once at least one skill is enabled. UI Builder is only needed for further customization.
Q. Do cloned skills persist after upgrades?
Yes, cloned logic carries forward. If a skill has been heavily customized, test after upgrades. Use Skill Kit for deeper changes.
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