The Import screen moves an existing helpdesk into the desk. It reads your whole history, however far back it goes, and it is safe to run on a live desk. Start by choosing where you are moving from.
Freshdesk:
You need your Freshdesk address and an API key (click your picture, then Profile Settings, then View API Key; use an administrator's key so agent names come across). It brings tickets with their conversations and private notes, contacts, solution articles and, if you tick the box, attachments.
Zendesk:
You need your Zendesk address, the email you log in with, and an API token (Admin Center, then Apps and integrations, then APIs, then Zendesk API; switch on token access and add a token). It brings tickets with every public reply and internal note, your end users, Help Center articles and, if you tick the box, attachments.
Help Scout:
You need an App ID and App Secret (click your picture, then Your Profile, then My Apps, then Create My App; any name will do and the redirection URL can be your own site). It brings every conversation in every status with its replies and notes, and your customers. Docs articles and attachment files stay in Help Scout, because they sit behind a separate key, and the form says so rather than offering a box that does nothing.
LiveAgent:
You need your LiveAgent address (yourcompany.ladesk.com, or your own domain) and an API v3 key. In LiveAgent open Configuration, then System, then API, create an API v3 key and tick the read privileges for tickets (including all tickets), contacts, agents, tags and settings. A v1 key will not work. It brings every ticket with each email, chat line and internal note, your contacts, agents and tags, and, if you tick the box, attachments. Times arrive exactly as they happened, in your LiveAgent account's timezone. Deleted and spam tickets stay behind, and so does quoted earlier mail, so each message appears once. LiveAgent lists at most 10,000 tickets at a time, so a larger account is read in date order, window by window, with nothing missed and nothing doubled. LiveAgent's knowledge base is not in its API, so articles stay in LiveAgent and the form says so.
Anything else, by CSV:
Gorgias, Zoho Desk, HelpDesk, Groove, Kayako and most other helpdesks can export tickets to a CSV file. Upload it and press Check My File. Columns are recognised by what they are usually called (Ticket ID, Subject, Status, Requester Email, Created At, Message and so on), and before anything is imported the desk tells you how many rows and tickets it found, which columns it understood, which it will not use, and shows the first few tickets as it reads them. One row per ticket works. So does one row per message with the same ticket id on each, in any order. A sample file is linked on the screen. If the file has no status column every ticket arrives as closed, so nothing from an old export lands in your open queue.
What every import keeps:
- Original created, updated and closed dates, and the date on every message.
- Status, priority, tags and the channel the ticket arrived on.
- The agent who handled it, by name. If that agent has a WordPress account here under the same email, the ticket is assigned to them.
- Contacts, matched by email so nobody is doubled, first seen on the day they really first wrote in.
- Phone, chat and social tickets with no email address, kept under a placeholder address that can never be mailed.
Nobody is emailed and the AI is not run:
Imported tickets arrive silently. No triage, no auto-resolve, no drafts and no notifications, even when auto-resolve and auto-send are switched on. Nothing in your old helpdesk is changed or removed.
Stopping and carrying on:
Every helpdesk limits how fast it can be read, so a large one takes a while. Your place is saved as it goes. Press Stop after this batch, close the tab or lose your connection, then come back and press Continue The Import. When the other side asks for a pause the progress window counts it down and carries on by itself. If it stops answering altogether the import stops with the reason, keeps everything it has, and Try again from here picks up at the same ticket.
Running it again:
Every ticket, message and article remembers where it came from, so nothing is ever brought in twice. A second run skips what has not changed and tops up tickets that have new replies or a new status. Import a week before you switch over, then once more on the day. A newer CSV export of the same tickets works the same way.
Your details:
API keys and tokens are held only while an import is part way through, so that Continue works, and are wiped the moment it finishes or you press Forget This Import. They are never sent back to your browser. An uploaded CSV is removed from the server when its import finishes.
Taking it back out:
Each source has its own Take This Import Back Out button. It removes every ticket, message, stored attachment and article that came from that helpdesk, and nothing else. Tickets raised here are untouched and contacts are kept.