## What is the Inbox for?
The Inbox collects incoming messages — your customers' replies to your campaigns as well as messages they send you on their own. Unlike the [History](https://www.bulkgate.com/en/helpdesk/reporting/history/), which records outgoing traffic, this is the traffic coming back to you.

There are two ways to open it:

- click `Reports` and then `Inbox` in the menu,
- or click `Go to inbox` in the `Inbox` section of the `Dashboard`. That button only appears once an incoming message exists.

## What does the list show?
| Column | What it contains |
|:--|:--|
| `Product` | the product or integration the message belongs to, with the [wallet](https://www.bulkgate.com/en/helpdesk/payments-and-wallets/creating-wallet/) below it |
| `Sender` | the sender's phone number and their country |
| `SMS center` | the SMS centre the message arrived through; `Unknown` when it is not known |
| `Message received` | the time of arrival and the buttons for handling the message |

Clicking a row reveals the `Message text`, plus `Tag (TAG)`, `SMS center time` and, for a reply to a campaign, the `Campaign ID`.

> [!NOTE]
> The text of older messages is not kept forever. `This message has expired` appears in its place; all other data remains.

## How do I handle a message?
Each row carries two buttons:

- `Reply` opens the send-message window with the sender's number prefilled. The reply goes out as an ordinary message and is charged according to the [price list](https://www.bulkgate.com/en/helpdesk/payments-and-wallets/purchasing-credit/).
- `Mark as answered` ticks the message off. You can undo it at any time with `Mark as unanswered`.

You can filter on that flag too — in `Filter` choose `Message was answered` with the value `Yes` or `No`.

## What can I filter the Inbox by?
| Filter | What it narrows |
|:--|:--|
| `Phone number` | the sender's number |
| `Wallet` | the wallet the message falls under |
| `Campaign ID` | the campaign the customer replied to |
| `Tag (TAG)` | the custom marking of the message |
| `Country` | the sender's country |
| `Message was answered` | handled (`Yes`) or unhandled (`No`) messages |

Above the table there is also a period selector. The range can span at most `6 months`.

The `Export selected` button downloads the currently filtered list as a `CSV` file.

## When does a reply land in the Inbox?
For a customer to be able to reply, the campaign has to go out with a [sender type](https://www.bulkgate.com/en/helpdesk/sms/sender-type/) that supports [two-way SMS](https://www.bulkgate.com/en/products/two-way-sms/) in the destination country. Support differs by country and by the route chosen — check it in the $[price list](en:gb:sms).

> [!IMPORTANT]
> `Own number sender ID` always counts as two-way. In that case the reply goes straight to your own number, so it arrives on your phone rather than in the Inbox.