The Global rules screen
Event-to-action links that run outside flows: which events exist, how to narrow the filters, which actions you can pick and which automation a rule starts.
Last updated: September 30, 2026
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Event-to-action links that run outside flows: which events exist, how to narrow the filters, which actions you can pick and which automation a rule starts.
Last updated: September 30, 2026
Some jobs are not tied to a conversation: assigning a person to an agent when a "vip" tag is added, putting a new contact into a welcome sequence, starting a thank-you flow when a sale is recorded. Building a whole flow for those is overkill; the Rules tab does exactly this job. This guide covers every field on the screen.
💡 The difference between a rule and an automation: an automation starts from a message or an event and talks to the person; a rule fires when something changes on a contact and does not talk — it just applies actions and, if you want, starts an automation.
From the tabs on the Automations screen, switch to Rules. The page starts with the Global rules heading and its description: "They run outside flows: when something changes on a contact, the rule fires."
With no rules it reads No rules yet. You add one from the New rule section at the bottom of the page.
Creating and editing rules needs edit rights. With view rights you see the rules' names and which event they are bound to, but not the form.
Each rule sits on its own card. Its top line carries:
The body of the card is the rule's edit form. You do not go to a separate page to change a rule; you fix the fields and press Save rule.
The Event list holds seven options:
Where the event came from does not matter: the tag may have been added by a flow, by an agent by hand, or by another rule. The rule fires in all cases.
Four filter fields sit under the event. All are optional; an empty field means Any:
Which filter is useful depends on the event you picked: the Tag filter is meaningful for Tag added, the Conversion name filter for Conversion recorded.
⚠️ Note: Leaving a filter empty makes the rule very broad. A rule on "Tag added" with no filter fires whichever tag is added. Forgetting to write the tag is the most common cause of unexpected behaviour.
In the What happens section you list the actions the rule applies. Add action adds a row; a rule can hold at most 10 actions. With none it reads No actions added yet.
The actions you can pick are the same as in the Action step in a flow, minus the comment operations (Hide comment, Delete comment) — those need a comment to work on, and a rule has none:
What each action does is explained in Action.
Under the action list sits the Also start dropdown. Its default is Do not start an automation. Pick an automation and it will be started on the contact when the rule fires.
The hint under the field states an important condition: it starts if the chosen automation is live. Pick a draft or a switched-off automation and the rule still fires and applies its actions, but the flow never starts.
This field is what makes rules powerful: the rule catches "what happened", the automation carries "what to say".
A rule arrives on and starts working straight away. There is no publishing step.
A rule's action produces new events: a rule that adds a tag produces a "tag added" event, which may fire another rule. That chain does not run forever; it stops after a certain depth.
Even so, avoid arrangements where two rules fire each other: if rule A adds tag "y" when tag "x" appears, and rule B adds "x" when "y" appears, you have built something nobody can read.
An estate agency wants to route customers who state their interest to the right adviser:
rental.From then on, however the rental tag is added — by a flow, by an agent by hand, or during an import — the conversation is assigned to Mert, the team gets a notification and the information flow starts.
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