${mailto:template} does not include Email Template Message in mailto body (only watermark is populat

[ShumaS]

Hello experts,

I am experiencing an issue with the ${mailto:} functionality in a ServiceNow notification and would like to understand whether this is expected behavior or if I am missing a configuration.

Requirement

We are implementing email-based approvals with the following flow:

1. ServiceNow sends an approval request email to approvers.
2. The approver clicks an Approve/Reject mailto link.
3. The approver's email client opens a reply email.
4. ServiceNow receives the inbound email and updates the approval record based on the response.

Configuration

Notification Email Template A

Message HTML contains:${mailto:my_custom_mailto_template}
Email Template B (my_custom_mailto_template)

Subject:

Approve Request

Message:

Please enter your comments here.

Approve

Observed Behavior

The generated mailto link correctly creates:

• Recipient
• Subject
• Watermark

However, the content defined in the Message field of Email Template B is not included in the generated mailto body.

When clicking the mailto link, the email body only contains the watermark.

and none of the text configured in the Email Template Message field.

Questions

1. Is it expected behavior that ${mailto:template} ignores the Email Template Message field and only generates a body containing the watermark?
2. Is there any supported way to customize the mailto body while still using ${mailto:template}?
3. Has anyone successfully used an Email Template's Message field as the source for the generated mailto body?
4. If customization is required, is the recommended approach to generate the entire mailto URL via a Mail Script instead of using ${mailto:template}?

We would like to keep the OOTB mailto approval behavior (especially watermark handling) if possible, while allowing the mailto body text to be maintained in a template rather than hard-coded in a Mail Script.

Any insights would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.