---
name: support-handoff
description: Transfer a ticket between agents, shifts, or teams without the customer repeating themselves. Use when work crosses people and context is being lost.
---

# Support handoff

The clearest signal of a broken handoff is a customer explaining their
problem for the third time. Context lives in the receiving agent's
ability to read what happened, which depends entirely on what the
previous one wrote.

## Method

1. **Write the summary for the next agent, not for the record.** Current
   state, what has been tried, what was ruled out, and what to do next.
2. **State the customer's emotional context too.** Someone who has
   waited three days needs different handling from a first contact, and
   that is invisible in a transcript.
3. **Note what was promised.** Any commitment made must travel with the
   ticket, since an unfulfilled promise nobody knew about is the worst
   outcome.
4. **Hand off to a person, not a queue, where possible.** Named
   ownership survives; a queue diffuses responsibility (see
   agent-handoff-protocol).
5. **Make the transfer visible to the customer.** Telling them who now
   owns it and why prevents the sense of being passed around.
6. **Keep timezone handovers structured.** Follow-the-sun support needs
   a written handover per shift rather than reliance on reading history
   (see oncall-handoff).
7. **Verify the receiver has what they need.** A handoff is complete when
   accepted, not when sent.

## Boundaries

Handoff preserves context; it cannot preserve rapport, so minimising
transfers matters more than perfecting them. Detailed notes take time
that busy agents lack, which is a staffing reality. Notes about
customers are personal data and should stay factual (see
data-minimization).