Is there a way to prevent duplicate notifications from going out when a comment is attached from an inbound email?

andrewcrawford · ‎06-09-2016

Currently, by default, we send out notifications for every comment added to the incident form. However, we run into an issue when we email a client directly, and have the body of that email attached to the incident as a comment. This leads to the client immediately getting a notification with the same information they just received from the original email.

Since we need to make sure that comments added directly to the incident form are still sending out email notifications, we need to design something that will recognize when a comment is added from an inbound email, and know not to send out a notification. I originally tried designing a notification rule that overrides the existing comment notification, but I could not figure out which event to put in the "when to send" conditions that would lead to this rule working correctly. ServiceNow HI informed me that there was no way to accomplish this out-of-the-box, and that it could possibly be custom scripted, but I don't know how to go about doing that either.

Chuck Tomasi · ‎06-10-2016

Hi Andrew,

Can you explain "When we email them directly?" Are you talking about directly from Outlook (or some other mail client app) outside of ServiceNow?

If that's the case an the mail goes back to ServiceNow (and the user), ServiceNow updates the incident, triggers a notification with the same comments, and the user gets that one. Let me know if I'm close to hitting the dart board on this one.

If that's the case, this is a process issue more than a technology issue. The answer is, stop replying to messages from Outlook. ServiceNow doesn't have way to determine if the incident was updated from an email or from a browser. It just knows "Someone made comments, send an email."

View solution in original post

manikorada · ‎06-09-2016

Andrew,

Why can't you have a custom field like a checkbox which the Assignee can check if he has already sent an email. If the checkbox is checked you will not send an email.

Chuck Tomasi · ‎06-09-2016

Hi Andrew,

Take a look at the weight field in the Notifications. You can create your own priorities to avoid duplicates. Most people leave it at 0 (send regardless).

Email Notifications - ServiceNow Wiki

Chuck Tomasi · ‎06-09-2016

Another thing to check that many people forget is the field "Send to event creator". In many cases, the person making a comment doesn't need an email that they just made a comment (or other change.) Turning this checkbox off in the notifications prevents that "self-administered" notification. It doesn't sound like this is your case, but just throwing it in there as a common tip.

carlh · ‎06-09-2016

HI Chuck,

I have a similar issue and have already tried weights and setting a "flag" but it's just not working.

I set up 4 notifications to handle "Club Outages" category Incidents.

1. - notify IT internally upon insert - weight is 0

2. - After IT looks at it, they assign themselves and check a box if they want to notify a person at the club - weight is 150

3. Each time the incident is commented in Additional Comments, an update notification is sent - Weight is 100

4. Upon closing I send a notification again. - Weight is 0

The issue I have is that I didn't consider that the IT Tech would comment upon assigning themselves so they both fire at the same time. I've tried adding a flag (T/F) to be set after notification 2 is sent to avoid sending at the same time but they both still send and often it's an update received before the initial notification is sent so there is confusion caused.

Support says this is something for professional services but I feel this can be done without customization.

any ideas?

Thanks

Carl