# Escalating a commercial decision

The question, the deal and the customer's own words arrive together in Needs You, ranked against everything else waiting. A person answers it once. Their answer becomes the reply, is recorded against the deal, and — if it should hold in future — becomes Knowledge, which is the only step that stops the same question escalating again.

- **Status:** Available
- **Audience:** both
- **In the app:** #/needs-you, #/pipeline, #/knowledge
- **Last verified:** 2026-09-10
- **Canonical:** https://connectbyjbrh.com/docs/sales/commercial-escalation/

## What arrives, and where

Needs You is the single queue of decisions, approvals and operational problems for a person. It is ranked rather than chronological, because a commercial question from a customer waiting on a call is not the same debt as one raised on a thread that has been quiet for a week. Every entry drains by itself as its cause clears.

| Element | Why it is attached |
|---|---|
| The question in the customer's words | So the decision is made against what was asked, not a summary of it |
| The conversation it came from | The context sits above the decision rather than on another screen |
| The opportunity | Value, stage and history, so the answer is proportionate to the deal |
| What Connect could already answer | The grounded part of the reply is drafted; only the commercial part is open |
| The reason for the refusal | Which rule declined, so a person can see whether the gap is Knowledge or authority |

## Deciding

1. Open the item and read the customer's question before the draft.
   - Result: You are deciding a commercial matter, not editing prose — the draft is the smaller half.
2. Answer the commercial part. Edit the reply so it says what you have decided.
   - Result: Your words are what goes out; nothing is rewritten over your edit.
3. Approve, and the send runs through the same boundary a person's own send uses.
   - Result: The state is uncertain until the provider acknowledges it, then sent, with that evidence recorded.
4. Clear the review on the deal so it stops asking.
   - Result: `clear_review` returns it to the ordinary board; the audit keeps the fact that it was raised and by whom.

Rejecting instead of approving is also a decision, and it is recorded as one. A rejection stops that reply; it does not by itself teach anything, which is what the next section is for.

## Making the decision durable

The most common mistake here is answering well and changing nothing. A decision typed into one reply governs one reply. Three places make it hold, and they are not interchangeable.

**Knowledge** — For a term that is now true for everyone — a rate, a turnaround, a warranty. This is the one that turns a future escalation into a grounded answer.
**Memory against the contact** — For something true of this customer only. Contact-tier memory beats channel-tier, so it applies whichever way they get in touch.
**A standing instruction** — For how you want this class of question handled in future, when the answer itself is not a fixed fact.

> **Note** None of these retroactively changes the reply that has gone out, and none of them is a licence to invent. They change what counts as grounded next time, which is precisely the intended effect.

## What the customer experiences

While the question sits in the queue, the customer has had a reply that answered what could be answered and said a person is handling the rest. If the channel and autonomy allowed a promise, a follow-up carries it with a reason and a due time — and a follow-up more than a day late is closed as missed rather than acted on, because a very late call-back is worse than none.

- Nothing is in flight while the item waits: a held reply is no reply, not a slow one.
- The clock the customer is counting keeps running, which is why the queue is ranked.
- If the deal was raised for review, the board shows it as waiting rather than as progressing.

## When escalation is the wrong tool

- **The answer exists and nobody added it.** Repeated escalation of one question is a Knowledge gap wearing a workflow's clothes.
- **The question is not commercial.** A technical or support question belongs in a case, where it gets resolution tracking rather than a yes-or-no.
- **Nobody is watching the queue.** Escalation assumes a person. On a channel where replies are expected in minutes, agree who is on it before switching that channel on.

## Questions

### Who can answer an escalated commercial question?

Any workspace member permitted to send on that channel. The decision is recorded against the person who made it, so months later the log answers who agreed a term and when.

### Does the customer know their question was escalated?

They know a person is dealing with it, because the reply says so. They are not shown an internal queue, a rule name, or how long the item has been waiting.

### Can escalation be switched off so replies just go out?

The commercial rule is not a channel setting. Autonomy governs whether ordinary replies need approval; it does not grant permission to state terms no source supports.

## Related

- [Price, SLA and warranty: what Connect may say](https://connectbyjbrh.com/docs/sales/safe-sales/)
- [A commercial decision reaching a person](https://connectbyjbrh.com/docs/workflows/commercial-decision/)
- [Answering a commercial question, end to end](https://connectbyjbrh.com/docs/workflows/commercial-question/)
- [What Connect may do](https://connectbyjbrh.com/docs/autonomy/)
- [Knowledge in Connect](https://connectbyjbrh.com/docs/knowledge/)
- [Stage rules and refusals](https://connectbyjbrh.com/docs/sales/stage-rules/)

## What this page is based on

- docs-source/sources/GENERAL.md §5, §6 and §7 — Needs You, memory tiers and follow-ups
- docs-source/sources/CHANNELS.md §6 and §7 — review verbs and follow-up reasons
- Connect capability registry (docs-source/facts.py)