CRM & outreachUpdated 12 Aug 2026

Mail triage: turn your mailbox into CRM entries

Read the newest mail in a connected mailbox, see what each message is about and who it belongs to, and file it on the right customer or save an unknown sender as a lead, one approval at a time, with undo. Triage never replies to anything.

Your business mailbox is where the work actually arrives: an enquiry, a client sending their PAN card, a payment confirmation, a renewal notice. None of it is in your CRM until somebody copies it there, and that somebody is usually you, at 9pm.

Mail triage: what each message is about and who it belongs to (desktop view)
Mail triage: what each message is about and who it belongs to

Mail triage reads your newest messages, works out what each one is about, matches the sender to a customer or contact you already have, and suggests one thing for each: file it on that customer's timeline, or save an unknown sender as a lead. You approve or skip, one message at a time.

What it needs

A mailbox connected with an app password. Open Settings → Sending & deliverability and connect Zoho Mail, Fastmail, Gmail or your own mail server. The sign-in route (the Connect Gmail button) asks Google and Microsoft for permission to send only, so it has no permission to read anything. That is why triage needs the app-password route.

Outlook and Microsoft 365 cannot be connected this way at all: Microsoft retired password-based IMAP for those accounts. That is not a Finocket limitation and no setting will restore it.

Reading a mailbox uses IMAP PEEK, so looking at a message here never marks it as read in your own mail app.

Open it

Go to Inbox → Mail triage. Pick a connected mailbox and you get the newest messages, each with a suggestion.

What each suggestion means

  • File on record. The sender is already a customer or a contact of one. Approving writes one entry on their timeline (date, subject and a short summary), so the next person to open that customer sees the mail happened.
  • Save as lead. Nobody in your workspace knows this address yet. Approving creates the lead (with scoring, routing and the response timer your other capture channels use) and files the mail on it.
  • Nothing proposed. A no-reply address, a bounce, an out-of-office, a one-time code, or your own mail coming back to you. Triage says so and suggests nothing rather than turning a robot into a customer.

The category chip (New enquiry, Payment, Documents, Compliance, Needs attention) comes from words in the sender and subject, and the chip is followed by which words matched, so you can see why it decided that. It is a rule, not a guess: the same message is always read the same way.

What triage never does

  • It never replies. There is no reply box on this screen and no automatic acknowledgement behind it. Every message Finocket sends goes through the consent checks, from a screen where you can see who it is going to; triage is not one of those screens.
  • It never writes without you. Nothing is filed until you tap approve, every approval is recorded in your assistant activity log, and every one can be undone.
  • It never reads a whole message. Triage works from the sender, the subject and a short summary. Your mail stays in your mailbox. Finocket keeps no copy of it.

Undo

Undo removes the timeline entry it created. If the same approval also created a lead, undo removes that lead too, unless something has attached to it since (a deal, an invoice, another activity), in which case the lead is kept and Finocket tells you it kept it. It will not quietly delete a record somebody has started working on.

Not relevant

Not relevant sets a message aside so it stops asking. That is a personal decision: your colleagues still see it in their own triage list, exactly like unread marks on the WhatsApp inbox. You can bring it back at any time.

The same message twice

A filed message is marked Filed and cannot be filed again, even after a refresh or from a second device. Triage remembers a message by its Message-ID rather than its position in the mailbox, so moving it to a folder does not make it look new.

If your workspace has the assistant switched off

Triage suggestions are assistant actions, so they follow the autonomy setting on Settings → AI provider keys. With the assistant off, the list still reads and still explains itself, but approving is blocked, and it says so instead of failing quietly.

Frequently asked questions

Can Finocket reply to my mail from triage?

No, and no setting changes that. There is no reply box on the triage screen and no send path behind it. Everything Finocket sends goes out from a screen that shows you the recipient and checks their consent first; triage is a reading and filing tool, so it has no send path at all.

Why do I need an app password instead of just signing in with Google?

The Google and Microsoft sign-in buttons ask for permission to SEND only, so a mailbox connected that way cannot be read at all. An app password uses IMAP, which can list and fetch messages. That is what makes triage possible, and it also works on Zoho Mail, Fastmail and your own mail server, which the sign-in route never covered.

Does triage mark my mail as read?

No. Reads use IMAP PEEK, so a message you look at here is still unread in your own mail app.

Does Finocket store copies of my emails?

No. Triage works from the sender, the subject and a short summary, and it re-reads the mailbox each time you open the screen. When you approve a suggestion, what gets saved is a timeline entry with the date, the subject and that short summary, never the message body, and never an attachment.

Can the same message be filed twice?

No. A filed message is marked Filed and refuses a second attempt, including from another device. Triage identifies a message by its Message-ID rather than its position in the mailbox, so moving it to a folder does not make it look like new mail.

I set something aside by mistake. Do my colleagues see that?

No. 'Not relevant' is personal, like an unread mark. Your colleagues still see the message in their own triage list, and you can bring it back at any time.

What happens to a lead if I undo?

The timeline entry is removed, and the lead is removed too if that same approval created it and nothing has attached to it since. If a deal, an invoice or another activity has arrived in the meantime, the lead is kept and Finocket tells you it kept it.

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