On this page
  1. 1. Business hours in your own time zone
  2. 2. An offline greeting that sets expectations
  3. 3. The AI agent covers what it can
  4. 4. A message form people actually fill in
  5. The morning routine
  6. Weekends and holidays
  7. The takeaway

Look at when your visitors actually ask questions and you’ll usually find two peaks: one around midday and another in the evening, when people finally have time to browse. For many small teams, that second peak falls entirely outside office hours.

You don’t need a night shift to cover it. You need four things working together.

1. Business hours in your own time zone

Set the days and hours your team is really available, in your time zone. Outside those hours the chat switches to offline mode automatically — even if someone forgot to log out.

This sounds trivial, but it prevents the worst after-hours experience: a chat that looks online, takes the visitor’s message, and then sits silent until morning.

2. An offline greeting that sets expectations

The offline greeting has one job: tell the visitor what will happen. Compare:

  • “We’re offline.”
  • “We’re offline until 9:00 (Berlin time). Cubby can answer questions about shipping and returns right now — or leave your email and we’ll reply first thing.”

The second one answers three questions the visitor was about to ask.

3. The AI agent covers what it can

Many evening questions are simple: opening hours, delivery times, return windows. An AI agent answering from your knowledge base resolves those in seconds. A good setup for small teams is to let the AI answer only when everyone is offline: your team keeps daytime conversations, the AI takes nights and weekends.

When the AI can’t answer, it should say so honestly and offer the message form, not improvise.

4. A message form people actually fill in

Keep it short: email and question. Every extra field costs replies. Then make sure the message reaches someone:

  • send new offline messages to a team group chat or an inbox your team checks,
  • mark each one replied or closed so nothing is answered twice — or not at all.

The morning routine

Start the day with the overnight queue:

Three things to do each morning
  1. Reply to offline messagesThese people have already waited overnight
  2. Review what the AI answeredAnd which chats it handed off
  3. Fill knowledge gapsAny question asked twice gets an answer

Weekends and holidays

Before a holiday, update three things: the offline greeting (“We’re back on the 3rd”), any shipping answers affected by the break, and a disabled-until-later Q&A pair for anything temporarily untrue.

The takeaway

After-hours chat isn’t about pretending to be online. It’s about being honest, answering what can be answered right away, and making sure nothing that needs a person gets lost overnight.

Tagsbusiness hoursoffline messagesai agent
Related featureAI Chatbot for WebsiteAn AI chatbot for your website: Cubby answers common questions 24/7 from your knowledge base, cites every source and hands off to your team when unsure.See how it works

Related articles

AI customer service4 min read

When should an AI agent hand a conversation to a person?

Five hand-off triggers that keep customers from getting stuck with a bot — and the three mistakes that make AI support feel worse than no support.

Read article

AI customer service4 min read

How to write a knowledge base an AI agent can actually use

AI agents are only as good as the material they answer from. Seven writing habits that turn a messy help center into reliable answers.

Read article

AI customer service3 min read

Measuring an AI agent without fooling yourself

“The AI resolved 70%!” sounds great until you ask how it was counted. Four numbers that tell you whether AI support is actually helping.

Read article

Try it on your own site

A free plan with no time limit, AI agent included. One line of code.

Start free