# The inquiry desk, running: a teardown

> A teardown of the inquiry desk, a system I built that screens new email, drafts a reply and waits for my approval from a phone message.

The inquiry desk runs on my own inbox. It screens incoming email, drafts from my written rules, and waits for my approval on a phone message. One outside-address test on 2026-10-05 completed that path. Some checks are built and not yet run, and the limits are listed.

A lead emails while you're with a client. Waiting risks losing the conversation, but a rushed reply can start it badly. I built the inquiry desk so a screened, rules-based draft reaches my phone for review. I approve every draft before it sends.

*Diagram: An email arrives, the screen stops junk and out-of-scope mail before any AI cost, a draft is written, and I approve, edit or reject it from a phone message.*

## Where this example runs

This is my own inquiry desk, running on my own inbox since 2026-09-07. It has not been installed for a client yet.

## Demonstrated behavior

| Behavior | What happened |
| --- | --- |
| Junk screen | On 2026-09-07, junk and out-of-scope mail cost $0.00 because the screen stopped it before an AI step. |
| Approval controls sending | The part that reads and drafts cannot send. A reply reaches the send path only from the approval action. |
| Repeated approval | On 2026-09-07, five approve presses reached one draft within 2.2 seconds and one email went out. |
| Outside address | On October 5, 2026, one test lead from a Gmail address outside SignalNine produced a draft; I approved it on my phone and the reply went to that address. |

## Test coverage

| Check | Coverage |
| --- | --- |
| Failure alert | Observed on the live desk: the Telegram alert named the step that failed. |
| Rule-version switching | Built and not run yet; there has not been a new version to switch. |
| AI provider retry | Built and not tested against a real provider outage. |
| Named approvers | Built and not tested with a second Telegram account. |

## Known limits

- An email classified as a vendor pitch gets no card or alert. A live test misread one inquiry that way, so that path can hide a real lead.
- Approval cards and failure alerts share one Telegram chat. If that chat is unavailable, neither reaches me there.
- A first draft reads the email thread, but a rewrite I request does not yet reread it.
- The outside-address path is one dated test.

## Each step, and who does it

The system does the reading and the writing. I make every decision that reaches a lead.

*Each step of the inquiry desk, what the system does on its own and what I do.*

| Step | What the system does | What I do |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Email arrives | Picks up new mail sent to the inquiry inbox and checks whether it belongs to a conversation already under way | Nothing yet |
| Screen | Stops newsletters, personal mail and other obvious junk, before any AI step runs | Nothing, because screened mail never reaches my phone |
| Sort | Reads the whole email and decides whether it is an inquiry, a follow-up or a vendor pitch; a pitch ends the run with no card | Nothing |
| Draft | Reads my written rules and what I sell, reads the earlier emails if it is a follow-up, then writes a reply | I keep the rules up to date |
| Flag | Marks emails that need a closer look, such as a request to confirm a compliance standard, and keeps them off the send path | I decide what to do with each flagged email myself |
| Phone message | Sends me a card with the email, the details it picked out, the cost of the run and the draft | I read it wherever I am |
| Approve, edit or reject | Waits for my answer, and rewrites the draft when I reply to the card with changes | I approve it, ask for changes or reject it |
| Send | Sends one email per approval from the business address and records what went out | Nothing more |

## The screen runs before anything costs money

Plenty of the email that reaches a business address has nothing to do with a lead: newsletters, receipts, personal mail. The screen stops those first, with plain checks, before any AI step runs. In the live run on 2026-09-07, junk and out-of-scope mail cost $0.00 on my own inbox.

The first screen removes obvious junk. A second check then decides whether the message is an inquiry, a follow-up or a vendor pitch.

## The draft comes from my own rules

Everything about the business is written down in one place: what I sell, examples of how I write, and which emails it should flag for me to check closely. It reads that before every draft. When the email is a follow-up, it reads the earlier emails in the conversation before it drafts.

Its written rules tell the drafting step not to make up a price or delivery date. I can change the rules when the business changes.

## Approve, edit or reject from a phone message

The draft arrives on my phone as a card. It has the email, a couple of details I care about, the cost of the run and the draft reply. If I want changes, I just reply to the card, and it updates the draft. I can type the change or say it, and a spoken reply is transcribed first.

A change still has to follow the rules. When I asked it to add a rough price without giving it a figure, it left the price out and told me the rule against inventing pricing blocked the change. A price only goes in when I type the figure myself.

When the draft is right, I press approve and the reply goes out from the business address. If it's wrong, I reject it, or save it as a draft and write the reply myself. I approve every reply.

## One email per approval

Approve buttons get pressed twice, by a slow connection or an impatient thumb. In the live run on 2026-09-07, one draft received 5 approve presses in 2.2 seconds, and 1 email went out. One press sends, and the rest are recorded without sending anything again.

## What stays with me

- Sending follows an approval on the card.
- I supply every price figure. The draft leaves it out otherwise.
- Flagged emails stay off the send path for me to handle.

## Questions

**Does it reply to leads automatically?**

Only after I approve. The draft comes to me first, and the email goes out when I press approve.

**Can its rules be changed?**

Yes. The rules and examples of how I write are kept in one place, and every change is saved as a new version.

**What does a lead see?**

An email reply from the business address, sent after I approved it. They never see the card, the draft or my edits.

**Why not let it send the easy replies on its own?**

A reply is the start of a relationship, and I want to read it first. Approving from my phone takes seconds, so the approval step costs me little and catches the draft that would have started things on the wrong foot.

**What happens if the system breaks?**

The live failure I observed produced a Telegram alert that named the failed step, and the original email remained in the inbox. A failure can delay the reply. Approval cards and failure alerts share one Telegram chat, so if it is down, neither reaches me.

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## Related

- [A drafted reply to each lead, approved from my phone before it sends](https://signalnine.io/md/systems/inquiry-desk): AI drafts replies to lead emails that pass a junk screen, from my business facts. Risky asks get flagged, and nothing sends until I approve it on my phone.
- [The lead-response bottleneck: how fast to answer a new lead](https://signalnine.io/md/bottlenecks/lead-response): How fast to answer a new lead, why a slow reply hands the decision to someone else, and a system that drafts from your rules for a person to approve.
- [What a reliable automation looks like](https://signalnine.io/md/guides/reliable-automation): Five properties any automation should have, checkable by an owner who doesn't build: logged runs, named alerts, one send per approval, safe reruns, an owner.
- [How do I approve email replies from Slack before they go out?](https://signalnine.io/md/integrations/gmail-to-chat-approval-to-reply): Approving email replies from Slack, Telegram or Google Chat: what the built-in apps do, where an approval loop breaks, the send-once rule, and what I'd pick.
- [Human-in-the-loop approval](https://signalnine.io/md/glossary/human-in-the-loop-approval): What human-in-the-loop approval means in an automation, which steps should wait for a person, and how an approval card makes sure an email sends once.

## Referenced by

- [Hire an n8n consultant to fix your inquiry, proposal and onboarding handoffs](https://signalnine.io/md/guides/hire-an-n8n-consultant)

---
Mashrur Rahman, Founder, SignalNine. Published 2026-10-12, updated 2026-10-12.
Id: U02
Canonical: https://signalnine.io/guides/inquiry-desk-teardown