Set up and enable Chat

  • Updated on Apr 25, 2026
  • Published on Mar 10, 2026
  • 5 minute(s) read
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Overview

Before you enable Chat, set yourself up for success by making sure that you're ready. Get immediate results by planning resources for Chat, setting Chat up, ensuring your notification templates are Chat-ready, and giving your office employees permission to view and/or use Chat before you enable Chat.

Be sure that an administrator is available to manage Chat settings. As with other settings, managing Chat setup requires admin permissions.

 Who uses this feature

  • Administrators

 Feature configuration

  • Account configuration is required to use this feature. To update your account, please contact your success or implementation manager for details.

  • View customer chats or Allow full access to customer chats permissions are required to use this feature. Please contact the account administrator on your team.

Things to know

  • Be sure that an administrator is available to manage Chat settings. As with other settings, managing Chat setup requires admin permissions.

  • A toll-free number set as the MMS number will not receive photos in Chat.

  • You can advertise the local number designated for MMS as the number to text a photo of the issue if the lead or customer wants to book an appointment.

  • Automated notifications only appear in a customer's chat log if there's already a manual conversation thread with them. 

  • Enterprise Hub users can configure chat settings for specific accounts. Enable the Access Chat Settings permission in Enterprise Hub to access Chat settings in ServiceTitan. For more, see Manage user roles in Enterprise Hub.

  • You can’t delete photos from text threads. Contact Technical Support for assistance.

Train your office employees

  • Because of the nature of the Chat medium, customers will expect a timely response from you, so be sure to resource correctly. The goal should be to achieve close to a 100% response rate on incoming chats.

  • If you are able, dedicate an in-house, industry-educated, savvy CSR with strong communication skills to handle Chat. Having a designated and properly-trained Chat CSR means sending better responses more quickly, increasing customer confidence and trust and delivering a more positive customer experience.

  • Create a planned-out process for addressing customer complaints and escalations that may come up over Chat. Be ready for every possible scenario that could play out over Chat from basic scheduling, rescheduling, dispatching, and invoicing to customer complaints and escalations.

  • If you have a local number for receiving photos, be sure your CSRs know to give it to customers who want to send you image and video files. You can advertise any local number as the number where a lead or customer can text a photo or video of the issue to book an appointment. Customers cannot share a photo to toll-free number; images and videos sent to a toll-free number do not show up in Chat.

Set up Chat

  1. Go to the top toolbar and click Settings A simple icon representing a settings gear. . 

  2. In the side panel, click Communications > Chat.

  3. Read the terms of use, and then click Accept.
    Legal agreement for ServiceTitan's SMS communication functionality with customer consent requirements.

  4. Check the Chat settings screen to ensure that you have chosen default SMS and MMS phone numbers. If you have already done so for Customer Notifications, the green check marks indicate that you are already set up.
    Settings page for chat features, including phone number setup and chat permissions.
    The default phone numbers are the numbers that customer notifications will be sent from. All phone numbers you have through ServiceTitan that have Allow incoming sms checked are capable of receiving incoming texts.
    Editing call settings with options for continuity number, SMS, campaign, and call type.If you have not already set up a default SMS and/or MMS number, go to Settings A simple icon representing a settings gear. > Phones > Phone Numbers and enter the Outbound SMS/MMS number.
    Phone numbers section displaying outbound SMS and MMS options for call continuity.For more on setting up default SMS and MMS numbers, see Set up outbound (default) numbers for text notifications (SMS and MMS).

Edit notification templates

The best way to take advantage of Chat is to send Booking Confirmations, Reminder Notifications, Dispatch Notifications, and Job Completion Surveys through Customer Notifications. Set up the templates for text notifications to maximize how chat messages build your relationships with your customers by including your personality and branding.

  1. Go to the top toolbar and click Settings A simple icon representing a settings gear. .

  2. Click Communications > Customer Notifications.

  3. Select the notification type you’d like to customize to edit it.

Overview of customer notification settings for text and email communications.

When updating your text notification template, make sure the message makes it clear that it's from the office rather than from a technician. There could be costly miscommunications if customers assume that they are texting with the technician rather than with a CSR over Chat. Additionally, you should set the right expectations about when a customer should expect to hear back from you and what happens when a customer texts you after-hours.

In addition to editing your text notification templates, increase customers’ awareness of Chat by updating the verbiage of all your notification templates. Let customers know that they can reply to a text notification if they have questions or need to make changes to their appointment. If you have a dedicated CSR for Chat, you can add that CSR’s signature at the end of your notifications.

For information on how to set up and customize notifications, see Customize notification message templates and  Enable Notifications.

Note: Automated notifications only appear in a customer's chat log if there's already a manual conversation thread with them even though you can still find these notifications in search results and on related customer/location/job pages. The chat feature filters out only those chat threads where customers are actively involved.

Add employees

After you have set up Chat for use, give the relevant employees permission to access and use it. Add at least one CSR:

  1. Go to the top toolbar and click Settings A simple icon representing a settings gear. .

  2. In the side panel, click Communications > Chat.

  3. Under Setup Chat permissions for employees, click Edit employees.
    Settings page for chat features, including phone number setup and employee permissions.

  4. From the Employees screen, click Edit next to each of the employees who you would like to access Chat. The employee permissions screen appears.
    Settings for customer communication permissions including chat and call access options.The following permissions are available for Chat:

    1. View customer chats: This allows the employee to view Chat messages.

    2. Allow full Access to customer chats: This allows the employee to send and respond to Chat messages.

      Note: If Allow full Access to customer chats is checked without View customer chats also being checked, the employee will not have any access to Chat. The full access permission requires the read permission to be checked.

Enable Chat

After you have set up Chat and ensured that you have granted access to Chat to at least one CSR, you can enable Chat by toggling it on from the Chat settings page.

Settings page showing options to enable chat and manage phone numbers for employees.

Test Chat

After you have set up Chat, you can test it to ensure it’s working as you intended. If you want to text into Chat as a test, be sure to text using a number that is not saved as an employee or technician number in the system, as only messages from customers or leads appear in Chat. Messages from employees and technicians appear in the Dispatch Board alert panel, not in Chat.

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