Your Conversation Board
See every live supplier and customer conversation on one board — what needs you, what's waiting on a reply, and which threads the AI is carrying.
What the Board Is
The Conversations screen is a board of every exchange that's actually happening right now — across all your RFQs, suppliers, and customers, in one view. Instead of opening RFQs one by one to find out who's waiting on you, you see all of it at once.
Open it from Conversations in the navigation. Your home page also carries a Conversations drawer that shows the live count ("3 waiting on you") and links straight through.
The board covers live exchanges, not your archive. A conversation earns a card while somebody is still waiting on it; settled ones drop off on their own. See What Reaches the Board below.
The Four Columns
Every card sits in exactly one column, and Buyer24 decides which from the real state of the conversation — you don't file them yourself.
| Column | What's in it |
|---|---|
| Needs you | Something is flagged for your attention, there are unread replies, or the AI has staged something awaiting your approval. Start here. |
| In progress | A live back-and-forth. Includes anything whose last message came in — the other side isn't the one you're waiting on. |
| Waiting on reply | You spoke last and it's been quiet for at least a day. The card shows how long ("4d silent"). |
| Recently resolved | Awarded, declined, or closed with no response — kept briefly so you can see how it ended, then it drops off. |
Cards aren't draggable. The column reflects what's actually true about the conversation, so moving one by hand would only make the board lie to you. Answer the message and the card moves itself.
Reading a Card
Each card carries, top to bottom:
- Who it's with — the supplier contact or customer you're talking to.
- When, and who spoke last — "2h ago · by B24 agent", "by you", "by team", "by supplier", "by customer".
- A short preview of the latest message, with quoted reply history stripped out so you read the new part, not your own last email quoted back.
- Who owns it — the assignee, or "Not assigned".
You may also see:
- Approval needed — the AI has something staged and stopped for your go-ahead.
- Awarded — this supplier won; the card is the one strongly coloured one on the board.
- "4d silent" — days since your last message went out with no answer.
- Someone's viewing — a teammate has this conversation open right now.
AI-Assisted vs Human-Led
The whole card is tinted by who is driving the conversation:
- Tinted (indigo) — AI-assisted. The last message out was composed by Buyer24 — autopilot, your assistant, or a clarifying reply to a customer.
- Plain white — human-led. A person on your team typed the last message, or has taken over a customer thread from the assistant.
An amber edge marks anything needing attention, whichever the driver.
Because the tint is on every card in every column, the board's overall colour tells you at a glance how much the AI is currently carrying — without hiding whether a given thread needs you.
Note: A conversation switches to human-led the moment someone on your team replies in it. You don't have to flip anything.
Filters and Search
Filter pills across the top, each with a live count:
| Filter | Shows |
|---|---|
| All | Everything on the board |
| Mine | Conversations you personally wrote in |
| AI-assisted | Threads the AI is currently driving |
| Human-led | Threads a person is driving |
| Needs attention | Flagged, unread, or awaiting your approval |
The search box matches the supplier or customer name, the customer the request is for, the subject, the message preview, and the request ID — so pasting an RFQ number finds its conversations.
If a filter or search empties the board, you'll get "No conversations match this view" with a reset link — distinct from a genuinely empty board, so you're never left wondering which one you're looking at.
Opening a Conversation
Click any card and the conversation opens right there on the board — you don't lose your place.
- Supplier conversations open the same thread view as the RFQ inbox, with the full history and a composer. Opening it marks the replies read.
- Customer conversations open the customer thread, including the assistant toggle if you want to take over or hand back.
- Open RFQ in the dialog header jumps to the full request; Back to Conversations returns you to the board.
Close the dialog and the board refreshes immediately, so counts and columns reflect what you just did.
What Reaches the Board
A conversation stays on the board while somebody is plausibly still waiting on it:
- Flagged, unread, or awaiting approval — kept for up to 30 days. An unanswered question doesn't stop mattering because it got old.
- Resolved — kept about 7 days so you can see the outcome. If it resolved and you spoke last with nothing flagged, it drops straight away — there's no open loop.
- Everything else — the last two weeks of activity.
Anything the board holds back is counted, never silently dropped: a line under the columns reads "N older conversations not shown". Your full history always lives on each RFQ.
A few things deliberately never get a card:
- Draft threads nothing has been said in yet — unless the AI has staged a send on one, which is exactly when you need to look.
- Suppliers you've deactivated, and unrecognised catch-all threads.
- Intake emails you forwarded in — those live on the request they created, not as a conversation.
- A customer named on an RFQ who has never written in. Naming a customer isn't a conversation; the card appears once there's an actual exchange.
If a request needs attention but has no conversation at all — a fresh intake draft flagged before any supplier is attached, say — it won't have a card. You'll find it under Needs attention in your requests list and in your home-page to-do list.
Who Sees What
The board obeys the same access rules as your requests list: you only see conversations on RFQs you can already open. A buyer sees their own requests' conversations; managers and admins see the organization's. Nothing on the board widens access to anything.
The board refreshes every few seconds while you're looking at it, and pauses when you switch tabs.
FAQ
How is this different from my requests list?
The requests list is organized by request; the board is organized by conversation. One RFQ with four suppliers is one row in the list and up to five cards on the board — so "which supplier is waiting on me" is a glance instead of a hunt.
Why did a conversation disappear?
It was resolved, or it went quiet past the window the board covers. Nothing is deleted — open the RFQ and the full thread is there. The "N older conversations not shown" line tells you how many are being held back.
Can I move a card to another column?
No — columns are derived from the real state of each conversation. Reply, award, or resolve, and the card moves itself.
Why is a card tinted when I wrote the last message?
Check whether the last message out was actually yours — an autopilot follow-up sent after your reply makes the AI the current driver. The "by …" line on the card names who spoke last.
Do I need autopilot for this?
No. The board shows all live conversations whether or not any AI is involved; without autopilot, they'll simply all read as human-led.
Does opening a card mark things read?
Yes, for supplier threads — opening the conversation clears its unread count, the same as opening it from the RFQ.