Making Inquiru your Zendesk chat AI (default setup)

Overview

This is the recommended setup for most teams: Inquiru handles every customer chat message from the moment the conversation starts. No upstream bot, no handoff timing — Inquiru is the chat AI. If you want to keep an existing Zendesk bot alongside Inquiru, see the coexistence guide instead.

Confirm Inquiru's Respond mode is 'Always'

On the Integrations page, edit your Zendesk integration and check the Bot coexistence panel. Respond mode should be Respond to every customer message (the default). Any handoff phrases or greeting messages here are harmless in this mode but can be left blank for cleanliness. Save.

Configure your Messaging widget welcome

Without an upstream bot, the chat widget can feel empty before the customer types. Open Admin Centre → Channels → Messaging, edit your widget, and set a friendly welcome banner under Conversation, e.g. "Hi! Tap below to ask anything — our AI assistant is here to help." The customer types their question; Inquiru replies within 1–3 seconds.

Remove any existing Zendesk bot from the widget

If your workspace previously had a Zendesk bot (Bot Builder, Answer Bot, or the AI Agents add-on) attached to the chat widget, detach or disable it now — otherwise both bots reply to every message. In Bot Builder this usually means deactivating the bot or removing it from the Messaging brand configuration. Test by opening the widget as a fresh customer; only your welcome banner should appear.

Critical — exclude Messaging from the ticket-trigger allowlist

This is the single most common source of duplicate replies. Zendesk Messaging sessions create tickets in the background, and each customer chat message becomes a public comment — which would fire the Inquiru ticket trigger and cause a second reply.

Edit both Inquiru triggers in Admin Centre → Triggers. Make sure the Channel condition allowlist is Email, Web form only — NOT Messaging, NOT Chat. After this, the ticket reply path and the Sunshine chat reply path stay cleanly separated.

Test end-to-end

1. Open your site in a fresh incognito window. Click the chat widget — you should see only your welcome banner. Type a real question.
2. Within 1–3 seconds Inquiru replies in the chat with a substantive answer.
3. Only one Inquiru reply appears per message — confirm by re-reading the transcript.
4. A ticket is created in Zendesk (Messaging channel) for audit history. The ticket trigger did NOT fire — check the trigger's activity log.
5. Send a follow-up; Inquiru handles it with full conversation context.
6. Verify the email path still works by sending a test email to your support address.