Live chat for schools, colleges and training providers
Admissions questions come in waves, and parents often look things up after work. Help them find answers without adding to the office's phone queue.
The school office is always busy
Offices juggle visitors, calls and everything else. Questions from a website are easily left behind.
- Term dates, uniform and admissions questions are asked again and again.
- Busy periods such as admissions deadlines swamp the office.
- Parents and applicants look for answers in the evening, when the office is closed.
- You need to be careful about who is on the other end of a chat, and what is said.
How Orbis Chat helps the office
Aim chat at parents, applicants and adult learners, under your own safeguarding policies.
Help centre
Publish term dates, uniform, admissions and fees, with search inside the widget. See how self-service works.
Departments
Send admissions and general questions to the right members of staff.
Business hours and offline tickets
Make your hours clear, and pick up evening messages as tickets the next day.
Translation
Agents can translate messages, which helps with families who speak other languages.
Audit log and roles
Give staff the right access, and keep a record of what happened in the account.
Worked example: an admissions deadline
A college expects more questions as its application deadline gets closer.
Prepare the answers
Staff publish articles on deadlines, entry requirements and open days.
Add a timely trigger
A message on the admissions page offers help after a visitor has been reading for a while.
Route to admissions
A keyword rule sends these chats to the admissions department.
Review afterwards
Reports and tags show which topics came up most, ready for next year.
This is an illustration of how the features fit together, not a real customer story.
Frequently asked questions
Can pupils use the chat?
Orbis Chat accounts are for adults at organisations, and you should aim chat at parents, applicants and adult learners. Any use involving children needs to fit your own safeguarding and data protection policies.
Can we keep chats for a set time?
Yes. Data retention settings let you choose how long data is kept, and you can export or delete a person's data.
Can several departments share one account?
Yes. You can set up departments, with unlimited agents.
