Escalating a case marks it for urgent attention: the case moves to the Escalated status and gets a permanent Escalated flag, and it can be handed to someone else in the same step. Escalation sits in the middle of the case lifecycle. A case is logged and worked, escalates when it needs more than its current handling, and then goes on to Resolved and Closed as usual. Cases also escalate without anyone acting: an SLA breach sets the Escalated flag on its own.
Overview
There are two escalation signals on a case, and they are not the same thing:
- The Escalated status is where the case is. It changes again as work continues.
- The Escalated flag (the Escalated checkbox on the case's SLA tab) is what happened. Once set, nothing in xMatix clears it, so it still marks the case after it is resolved or closed.
The Escalate action sets both. An SLA breach sets only the flag.
When to use it
Escalate when a case needs attention its current handling can't give it. Typical reasons are a stalled resolution, a severity discovered part-way through the work, or a customer commitment at risk. If the case only sits with the wrong person, change Assigned To or route it again instead. See Queues and omni-channel routing.
How xMatix handles it
- The Escalate action sets Status to Escalated, ticks Escalated, and, when it is given an assignee, sets Assigned To in the same save. It does not change Owner, the SLA policy or the due dates.
- The shipped case page has no Escalate button. The action exists on every case and the shipped profiles grant it, but the case page's header lists only Appointment, Lead, Opportunity, Service Order, Duplicate, Edit and Delete. An administrator adds the button to the page, or runs the action from a business rule. See Configuration.
- SLA breaches flag the case. When the background SLA job finds that a milestone has passed its target, the case's SLA Status becomes Breached and Escalated is ticked. Status is left as it was.
- Timeline. Escalating writes a Status changed from … to Escalated entry on the case timeline, plus an assignment entry when Assigned To changes. A breach is recorded as a Breached entry among the case's SLA events.
Prerequisites
- Permission to run Escalate on cases. See Permissions.
- The Escalate button on your case page, which your administrator adds. Without it, escalation happens only through automation.
Procedure
Step 1 — Check the case before you escalate
The person who receives an escalated case has to work from what the record says. Before escalating, make sure the account, contact, subject, description, priority and severity describe the problem as it stands now, and save any edits.
Step 2 — Run Escalate
Open the case from Support → Cases and select Escalate in the page header. Confirm when xMatix asks. From the case page, Escalate escalates in place: it keeps the current Assigned To. To hand the case to someone else, change Assigned To on the People & Queue tab as a separate edit.
Step 3 — Check what changed
After the action completes, the case shows:
- Status Escalated in the page header.
- Escalated ticked on the SLA tab.
- A Status changed from … to Escalated entry on the timeline.
- The SLA clock running. Escalated is an active status, so a clock paused by On Hold, Waiting on Customer or Waiting on Third Party resumes. An SLA policy can list its own Pause Statuses, and if a policy lists Escalated, the clock pauses instead.
The case now appears in the Escalated Cases view of Support → Cases.
Step 4 — Work the case to resolution
An escalated case leaves Escalated the normal way. Move it to In Progress while the work continues, then to Resolved (which needs a Resolution Summary) or Closed (which needs a Close Reason). The shipped status rules stop an escalated case from moving back to New or Reopened. The Escalated flag stays ticked.
Fields
These are the case fields escalation reads or writes. The full field list is on Managing cases.
| Field | What it means | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Status | Where the case is in its lifecycle | Escalate sets Escalated. The shipped Status picklist doesn't include Escalated — see Configuration. Shown in the page header. |
| Escalated | The case has escalated at some point | On the SLA tab. Set by Escalate, by saving the case with Status Escalated, or by an SLA breach. Nothing clears it automatically. |
| Assigned To | Who is working the case now | Changed by Escalate only when an assignee is passed to it, which a business rule or the API can do. |
| SLA Status | The case's overall SLA state | OnTrack, Warning, Breached, Met or Paused. Breached also ticks Escalated. |
Business rules
- Escalate checks nothing about the current status. The shipped transition rules check status changes made by editing the case. Escalate sets the status after those checks have run, so they don't stop it. Escalating a Resolved, Closed or Cancelled case moves it to Escalated.
- Moving out of Escalated is blocked to New and Reopened by the shipped rule Block Case Transition from Escalated. Moving into Escalated by editing is blocked from Resolved, Closed and Cancelled. Administrators can edit or turn off these rules.
- Saving a case with Status Escalated ticks Escalated, whichever way the status got there.
- A breach ticks Escalated and sets SLA Status to Breached, without changing Status. Warnings and breaches are applied by a background job, so the flag appears shortly after the deadline, not at the exact second.
- Macros can't escalate. A macro's Call server action step runs only the automation scripts bound to an action, not the Escalate action itself. A macro can still add the note and other changes around an escalation. See Macros.
Example
A customer reports that a cold-room compressor has failed for the second time in a week. The case, CASE-0412, is In Progress with a first-line agent, Priority High, and the customer has said the stock is at risk by evening.
- The agent updates the description with the second failure and the evening deadline, and saves.
- The agent selects Escalate in the header and confirms. Status becomes Escalated, Escalated is ticked, and the timeline shows Status changed from In Progress to Escalated.
- The team lead sets Assigned To to a senior engineer on People & Queue and saves. The timeline records the assignment.
- The engineer replaces a relay the same afternoon, writes the Resolution Summary and moves the case to Resolved. The case leaves the Escalated Cases view, but Escalated stays ticked, so it still counts in escalation reporting.
Training
Practice exercise
In a sandbox where an administrator has added Escalate to the case page:
- Create a case for a test account and leave Assigned To empty. Then edit it and move Status to On Hold. Stopped Since fills in.
- Run Escalate on it.
- Expected result: Status is Escalated, Escalated is ticked on the SLA tab, Stopped Since is empty again (the clock resumed), and the case is listed in Escalated Cases.
- Move it to In Progress. Expected result: the case leaves Escalated Cases, and Escalated stays ticked.
Quick reference
- Escalate = Status Escalated + Escalated flag, in one save.
- From the case page, Escalate keeps the current assignee. Change Assigned To separately.
- The shipped case page has no Escalate button until an administrator adds it.
- An SLA breach ticks Escalated but leaves Status alone.
- Escalated Cases lists cases whose Status is Escalated. Breached cases are in SLA Breached Cases.
- Escalated is never cleared automatically. Use it for reporting, and use Status for where the case is now.
- Escalated cases can't go back to New or Reopened under the shipped rules.
Permissions
Running Escalate needs the Escalate action allowed on the user's security profile (Setup → Access Control → Profiles → the profile → Actions tab). The shipped Sales Executive, Sales Manager, Standard User and System Admin profiles allow it. The shipped Service profile does not, so agents on that profile need it added. Users also need update access to cases. Without the permission, a user can't run the action. See Security profiles.
A business rule that runs Escalate runs it as a user (for a delayed rule, the user who created the case), and that user's profile must allow Escalate.
Configuration
| What you want | Where | What it affects |
|---|---|---|
| An Escalate button on the case page | Setup → Design Studio → Entities → Case → Experience → Layouts → the case View layout → Web Design → select the Page Header → Actions → add Escalate, then save | Users with the permission see the button. The shipped header lists its actions explicitly, so an action not in that list doesn't show. See Design a form layout. |
| Escalated in the Status drop-down | Case Status field → row menu → Manage PickList Values | Lets users choose Escalated when editing a case. Check the shipped status rules first (see Common problems). |
| Automatic escalation | Setup → Process Studio → Business Rules | A rule with a TriggerEntityAction action can run Escalate. See the recipe below. |
| Which statuses block moving into or out of Escalated | The Block Case Transition … rules in Business Rules | Edit or turn off to change the lifecycle. |
| Whether Escalated pauses the SLA clock | The SLA policy's Pause Statuses | Blank means On Hold, Waiting on Customer and Waiting on Third Party. See SLA policies and milestones. |
| When a breach happens | The SLA policy's response and resolution targets, business hours and warning % | A breach ticks Escalated. |
Recipe — escalate a new case nobody has picked up
- In Setup → Process Studio → Business Rules, create an inactive rule on Case.
- On the Condition tab, choose the trigger OnInsert — only when creating. Set the delay to Wait after the save, 4 Hours. Use the condition
Status == "New". It is tested again when the run is due, so a case picked up in the meantime is left alone. - On the Actions tab, add a TriggerEntityAction action with Entity Action Escalate. To reassign as well, add an argument
assignedToIdwith mode Static and a supervisor's user id. Leave Execution at As configured on the action. - Activate the rule. Test it with a case you leave in New. The delayed run appears in the background job list as a Delayed business rule, and its summary says what the action did.
Common problems
I can't find an Escalate button on the case
The shipped case page doesn't list it. Ask your administrator to add Escalate to the case page header (see Configuration). Until then, cases escalate only through business rules or SLA breaches.
Escalate is refused
Your security profile doesn't allow the Escalate action. This is the case for the shipped Service profile. Ask your administrator to allow it on the profile's Actions tab.
Escalated isn't in the Status drop-down
The shipped Status picklist has eight values and Escalated isn't one of them. Use the Escalate action, or ask your administrator to add the value.
I set Status to Escalated and saved, but it shows Assigned or In Progress
Two shipped rules run on every save and overwrite Status: Set Case Status To Assigned (when Assigned To is filled) and Set Case Status to In Progress (when First Response Date is filled). On most working cases one of them applies, so the edit doesn't stick and Escalated isn't ticked. Use the Escalate action, which sets the status after those rules run. Administrators can narrow or turn off the two rules in Business Rules.
The case shows Escalated but nobody escalated it
An SLA milestone breached. A breach ticks Escalated and sets SLA Status to Breached but doesn't change Status. Check the case's SLA events for the Breached entry.
A breached case isn't in the Escalated Cases view
Escalated Cases lists cases whose Status is Escalated. A breach changes only the flag, so breached cases are listed in SLA Breached Cases. To list every flagged case, an administrator can add a case view filtered on Escalated.
Escalated is still ticked on a closed case
That is expected. The flag records that the case escalated at some point, and nothing clears it automatically. Status shows where the case is now.
Common questions
Does escalating change who owns the case?
No. Escalate never changes Owner, the record owner in the security sense. It changes Assigned To, the person working the case, only when it is given an assignee, and only a business rule or the API can pass one. From the case page, change Assigned To yourself after escalating. Ownership changes when an agent accepts routed work or someone reassigns the record. See Queues and omni-channel routing.
Can escalation be automated?
Yes, in two ways. SLA breaches tick Escalated with no setup beyond an SLA policy. And a business rule with a TriggerEntityAction action can run Escalate after a delay or when a condition becomes true, optionally passing an assignee. The rule runs the action exactly as a user would, so the profile of the user it runs as must allow Escalate. Macros can't run Escalate itself. Their Call server action step runs only automation scripts bound to the action.
What is the difference between the Escalated status and the Escalated flag?
The status is where the case is now. It changes again as work continues, and the Escalated Cases view follows it. The flag is what happened. Once ticked, it stays ticked through resolution and closure, so escalation reports stay accurate. Escalate sets both. An SLA breach sets only the flag. Saving a case with Status Escalated also ticks the flag.
Does escalating change the SLA deadlines?
No. The SLA policy, First Response Due and Resolution Due stay as they were. Escalating only matters to the clock when the case was paused. Escalated is an active status, so a paused clock resumes and paused deadlines move forward by the business time spent paused. That changes if your SLA policy lists Escalated among its Pause Statuses.