What Email Group Rank, Grade, and Email Count mean

An inbound email group in VICIdial routes incoming email to agents much the same way an inbound call group routes calls. At the bottom of the email group's modify screen you will find a section that lists every agent attached to the group along with three numbers: a rank, a grade, and an email count for the day. Each of those numbers feeds a different routing method, so it helps to know exactly what each one does before you start changing them.

Rank: a fixed priority order

Rank is a per-agent, per-group priority number. When the email group uses the inbound_group_rank routing method, available agents are ordered by their rank for that specific group, highest to lowest, and the top-ranked available agent gets the next email. It is a strict ordering: a higher-ranked Agent always takes the email ahead of a lower-ranked one when both are free. Each agent's number is scoped to the group, so the same person can hold one rank on a sales email group and a different rank on a support email group.

Because rank behaves like a hard ladder, it is the cleanest way to make sure your strongest people clear the queue first. It mirrors the Agent rank idea you may already use for inbound call groups, and it is closely related to the Queue priority field that decides which group's work gets answered first overall.

Grade: a weighted lottery

Grade is different. It only matters when the group uses the ingroup_grade_random routing method, and instead of a strict order it gives a higher probability of receiving the next email to higher-graded agents. A grade is a chance, not a guarantee. A grade-5 agent and a grade-1 agent can both pick up the next email; the grade-5 agent just wins that draw more often over time.

Use grade when you want your best people to handle more email without starving everyone else of practice. The lower-graded agents still see real traffic, which keeps them sharp and gives you cover when the top agents are busy.

Email Count: a running tally

Email count is not a setting you choose; it is a counter VICIdial keeps. It tracks how many emails each agent has taken from that group for the day. You can read it on the email group screen to see how work is actually landing, and it is the number the fewest_calls routing method uses: when that method is active, the agent with the lowest count for the group receives the next email, which evens the load out across the team.

So the three numbers split cleanly by job:

• Rank decides a strict order — top rank first, every time.
• Grade decides odds — higher grade wins the draw more often.
• Email count is the day's running total, and it can drive an even-load method.

How they decide who gets the email

Only one routing method is active on a group at a time, so only one of these numbers is steering the next email. The flow below shows which number wins out depending on the method you picked.

flowchart TD
  A["New email arrives"] --> B["Which routing method?"]
  B --> C["inbound_group_rank"]
  B --> D["ingroup_grade_random"]
  B --> E["fewest_calls"]
  C --> F["Highest rank agent first"]
  D --> G["Higher grade wins draw"]
  E --> H["Lowest email count first"]
  F --> I["Agent receives email"]
  G --> I
  H --> I

Once you know which number does what, the next step is choosing the right one for your team. If you want a strict order, see how to rank agents for an email group. For the weighted-lottery option, read grade-random email routing, and for the even-load tradeoff see oldest versus fewest routing.

Email is just one piece of an inbound channel built around a Lead, a Disposition, and a clear Ingroup. The full picture lives in the inbound email and chat guide. Want all of this running on a managed box you do not have to babysit? See our pricing.