Gmail Delegated Account Mobile Access

EdwardDarrah · 06-27-2021 08:20 PM

Our company recently set up delegated accounts for customer support. The functionality of the delegated account feature works well in Gmail in the browser. However, it has been frustrating to learn that delegated email access is not available for the mobile version of Gmail. This has slowed our support service, as many of our employees use iPads and smartphones when managing support cases.

Has anyone found a workaround to access this feature via Gmail mobile app?

sebastiaan_jans

Sometimes, we solved it by letting people drop by the support desk and that we setup the delegated account on their device. So that you didn't have to give them the password.

EdwardDarrah

Thanks for the reply. Ideally, we would not have to share the login credentials with staff. Plus, it is easier to track who is responding to specific emails with the delegated feature.

CloudGuardians

You could use a group configured as a Collaborative Inbox. And then create a compliance rule to make sure that when a response has been sent to an email received by the group is also delivered to the other group members, to avoid double responses.

In any case, depending on the complexity of your support workflows and the size of your team you might need to consider a (free) helpdesk software (which I won't be naming here)

EdwardDarrah

Thanks for the reply and suggestion. We transitioned from a collaborative inbox and created a dedicated account for support. Unfortunately, we found a collaborative inbox to put many support inquiries into spam, even adjusting the settings to be less restrictive.

Maybe Google Workspace will be adding more features for this type of workflow. I am keeping my features crossed.

wbielecki

Hi, would you like to share how could one set up an expression for such a complaiance rule? If I understand correctly, it should should add the group's email as an additional recipient, but I'm not sure what the expression for the rule should be, so that it correctly catches appropriate messages.

CloudGuardians

In addition to the Group address the rule must also include "RE:" in the subject.

Let me know if you need more info.

KeithD

We really like the Collaborative Mailbox feature, but we found that groups.google.com is only available in a desktop web browser. On this page it makes no mention of mobile access under "Groups: Manage and participate in online discussions" https://support.google.com/a/users/answer/7334174

Having a look here under "Using new Groups on mobile" https://support.google.com/a/answer/9687393#zippy=%2Cusing-new-groups-on-mobile google tells us to use a desktop computer or switch our browser to desktop mode.

It seems unusual that Google would not have this integrated into the Gmail app, or a Groups app.

I wonder if they might be working on this?

andreas_berger1

Ah yes, my number 1 issue across all Google Workspace applications.
This was supposed to be fixed about 2 years ago Life after Outlook (Cloud Next '19) - YouTube

I suppose mobile is not mentioned in the clip, but I assumed that was going to be part of it as well.

As for your original question, we've not yet found a good or even "ok I can live with this" solution to the issue.
It is what it is, and obviously Google has no intention of fixing it.

EdwardDarrah

Thanks for sharing this video. It seems as if they were planning to hedge Groups functionality and delegated inbox directly into Gmail. I don't understand how you can have a full presentation like this, and it never is mentioned again "ghost feature."

I would venture to say this feature would have been and continue to be an asset since COVID and the transition to remote work. This is a huge missed opportunity on Google's part.

bill_pier3

As a mentioned alternative, a Google Group Collaborative Inbox might fit the need, but Groups doesn't have a mobile app, and Groups in a mobile browser is limited in Mobile mode, in that posting a new conversation requires opening the Desktop mode of Groups, which is even more difficult in a mobile browser.

Gmail Delegated access is available on a mobile device when Gmail is opened in Desktop mode in a mobile browser. Again, it's difficult in that the Desktop version of Gmail (and delegated Gmail) is not designed for a mobile browser, but it does work.