Agents, Roles and Permissions
The quick way to let a new support hire answer tickets is a WordPress administrator account. That account also opens plugins, themes, users and every site setting, so one wrong click becomes a website problem instead of a support problem.
Core Support checks its own capabilities and ships 2 roles: Support Agent for answering customers and Support Manager for running the help desk. People can work the help desk, and even run it, without becoming WordPress administrators.
The Two Core Support Capabilities
Core Support asks for one of 2 capabilities before it opens a screen:
core_support_work_tickets: answering customers. It opens the agent workspace under Core Support, Incoming mail and the Conversations tab of Chat. Everyone who has it appears in the Assigned to list.core_support_manage: running the help desk. It opens Settings, Connections, Connected sites, Integrations, Diagnostics and the Settings, Knowledge and Embed tabs of Chat.
Docs and changelogs use their own set of capabilities, such as edit_csp_docs, publish_csp_docs and manage_csp_collections. The Collections screen needs manage_csp_collections, and Docs insights needs edit_csp_docs.
A few things stay with WordPress administrators, because they need manage_options:
- the License screen
- the Use the support page as the site homepage switch under Settings → Page and URL
Who Gets What by Default
Core Support grants these on activation:
| Role | Work tickets | Manage Core Support | Docs and changelogs |
|---|---|---|---|
| Administrator | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Support Manager | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Support Agent | Yes | No | Yes |
| Editor | No | No | Yes |
Every other role gets none of them. A subscriber or customer account is a customer to Core Support and sees only their own tickets.
Updating from a version before 0.9.2 moves every existing Support Agent to Support Manager, so nobody loses the access they had.
What Each Role Can and Can’t Do
- Support Agent (
core_support_agent): the agent workspace, Incoming mail, docs, changelogs and the Conversations tab of Chat. Settings, Connections, Connected sites, Integrations and Diagnostics stay hidden, and so do the mailbox and storage links on the Incoming mail screen. - Support Manager (
core_support_manager): everything a Support Agent does, plus Settings, Connections, Connected sites, Integrations, Diagnostics and the Settings, Knowledge and Embed tabs of Chat.
Outside Core Support, both roles have only WordPress’s basic read capability. Neither one can:
- install or change plugins and themes
- add or edit users
- change WordPress settings
- edit regular posts and pages
- open the License screen or change the homepage
Both can write and publish docs and changelogs, because the roles carry the docs capabilities too.
Add a Support Agent or Manager
- Go to Users in wp-admin and add the person, or open their existing profile.
- Set Role to Support Agent, or to Support Manager for someone who also runs the setup.
- Save the user.
When they sign in without a specific destination, WordPress takes them straight to the agent workspace instead of the dashboard. They now appear in the Assigned to list on every ticket and in Default assignee under Core Support → Settings → Tickets.
Choose Between Agent and Manager
Settings, mailboxes, connected sites and integrations change how the whole help desk behaves. I’d give most of the team the Support Agent role and keep Support Manager with whoever owns the setup.
After an update from an earlier version, it is wise to go through Users once and set anyone who only answers customers back to Support Agent.
Agents in the Customer Portal
An agent who opens the customer portal sees it as a customer. The portal lists only tickets that agent opened, and it has no assignment or priority filters. The agent workspace is where agents see every ticket, private notes and the customer details beside each one, as described in Work Tickets in the Agent Workspace.
Multisite
Capabilities and roles belong to each site, so each site in a network keeps its own agents:
- An agent must be a member of the site to work its tickets or be assigned one. Super admins count as members.
- A signed-in user who isn’t a member of the site sees “You do not belong to this site.” in its support portal.
- Settings and tickets on one site never show on another.
Good to Know
- The Assigned to list in the workspace shows up to 100 agents, and the Default assignee list up to 200.
- Core Support → Diagnostics includes an Agent permissions check. It passes when administrators can work tickets, and Diagnostics and WP-CLI Commands explains every check.
- Changing someone’s role takes effect on their next page load. Their past replies and notes keep their name.
On a new help desk, add the agents first. Then pick a Default assignee and a default priority, as described in Ticket Intake, Priorities and New Senders.