How do I assign and edit a quick letter in Mail?

While much of your incoming correspondence can receive a stock reply with a Form letter from Letters, some incoming correspondence will necessitate a unique reply.

Unique replies are referred to as Quick letters, and they are assigned and edited on the specific constituent’s correspondence rather than in Letters.

Assigning and Editing a Quick Letter

To assign a Quick letter response rather than a Form letter response, follow the steps below:

1. Click to select an activity to view.
2. Message displays in the Incoming section of the Assign panel.
3. From the Assign panel read the incoming message.  Click the Show More link to display more of the message.

NOTE: If you are working with more than one activity and need to assign a Form letter, you will want to use the Assign window. See the Quick Tip “Assigning Form Letters in the Mail Viewer.”

4. In the “OutGoing” section of the Assign panel, set the Out Type to either "Email" or "Mail" depending on how you will respond.
5. From the Type, select the Quick radio button. If you plan to draft a letter from scratch, then leave the Letter field blank. If you plan to make edits to an existing letter from Letters, then type the correct letter code in the “Letter Field.” (You can also look up the letter by clicking the magnifying glass next to this field.)

NOTE: Selecting a letter in this field will not affect your Form letter stored in the Letter Library.
NOTE: If you select a letter from Letters has Fill-in fields, you will see them display below. Fill in the fields before going to the next step.

6. After filling out the necessary fields in the Assign panel, click the Edit Letter button.
7. This will open Word and merge in the contact's information. When you’re finished editing your document, close Word, and click Yes to save.

Checking In a Quick Letter

Even though you saved the document in Word, you also need to check the document into the CRM's Document Management System. This DMS keeps track of all document edits by versioning every letter you write, and you can access those published versions at any time from Version History located in the Edit Letter drop-down.

A letter can only be emailed or printed once it has been "updated/checked-in, and it can only be edited by other staff if it has been updated/checked-in.

To check in your Quick letter after editing and saving, click the orange Update Letter button.

NOTE: Send will also automatically check-in your Quick letter.

NOTE: Every time a Quick letter is edited, you will need to update/check-it in again so that every version will be saved.