If you have a large number of open conversations sitting in your inbox — especially old ones that no longer need a reply — you don't have to close them one by one. With charles, you can filter your conversations and then apply a bulk action to resolve multiple tickets or mark multiple tickets as answered at the same time.

This article walks you through how to do that, step by step.

Before you start

This feature is useful when you want to:

Clean up your inbox of tickets that have been open for a long time (for example, more than 7, 14, or 30 days)
Close out conversations that no longer require a response
Keep your All tickets view focused on conversations that still need attention

Step 1: Open your conversations

In the left-hand navigation, go to Conversations.
Under Tickets, select All. This shows every open conversation in your inbox.

Step 2: Filter your conversations

To find the tickets you want to close or mark as answered, use the filter panel:

Click the filter icon in the top-right corner of the Messages panel.
Under Time open, choose how long a ticket has been open:
- More than 7 days
- More than 14 days
- More than 30 days
Optionally, narrow your results further using the other filter fields:
- Assigned to — filter by agent
- Tags — filter by a specific tag
- Last message — filter by the date of the last message
- Status — filter by Answered or Unanswered
Once you've set your filters, click Apply.

The Time open filter lets you target conversations that have been sitting open for a while. Combine it with other filters like Tags or Status to narrow your results even further.

Step 3: Select the bulk action

After applying your filters, the matching conversations will appear in the Messages panel, along with a result count (for example, "1 result found").

Click the three dots (⋮) icon next to the search bar — this opens the Bulk actions menu.
Choose one of the following:
- Resolve tickets — closes the selected conversations
- Mark as answered — marks the selected conversations as answered without closing them

Use "Resolve tickets" to close conversations completely, or "Mark as answered" if you just want to update their status.

What happens next

Resolved tickets move to the Archived folder and disappear from the All view.
Tickets marked as answered stay visible in your inbox, but their status updates to reflect that they've been handled.

Why it's important to resolve completed tickets

Leaving finished conversations open isn't just a matter of a tidy inbox — it actively affects how your other tools can reach that customer.

When a ticket is open, it's considered an active escalation. An active escalation means the conversation requires a human agent, and it stays flagged that way for as long as the ticket remains open — even if the issue has already been resolved in practice.

While a ticket has an active escalation, the following happens:

Campaigns can't be sent to the customer. Anyone with an open ticket is excluded from campaign sends.
Flows can't be triggered for that customer.
The AI agent can't pick up the conversation. If the customer sends a new message while their ticket is still open, the AI agent won't respond — the message will wait for a human agent instead.

This is why it's important to resolve tickets as soon as they're actually completed, rather than leaving them open. Using the bulk resolve action above is an easy way to clear out old, finished conversations and make sure your customers can keep receiving campaigns, flows, and AI-assisted support without interruption.