Let customers subscribe to status updates
When an incident is created or updated, every subscriber gets an email. That’s the mechanism by which customers learn about issues without manually refreshing the status page. This article covers what you, as the tenant admin, need to do — which is mostly: send people to the public status page and let them subscribe themselves.
Before you start
- Customers can subscribe to incidents at any time, even before any incident exists. There’s no minimum.
- Decide which “from” address subscriber emails should use. Without setup, emails come from a platform default (
noreply@<atender-domain>). With setup, they come from your own email domain — much better for trust.
Steps
1. Configure the sender address (optional but recommended)
Go to Settings → Incidents Settings → General. Find the Subscriber email sender dropdown. Choose:
- Platform default (Atender) — emails are sent from Atender’s neutral domain. No setup needed, but the From line says Atender, not you.
- One of your configured email channels — emails are sent from a sending identity you control (e.g.,
status@yourcompany.com). Requires a verified email domain. See Add an email domain.
Click Save Settings. The change applies to all future subscriber emails immediately.
2. Point customers at the public status page
The page lives at https://<your-tenant>.atender.dev/incidents/<your-slug> or your custom domain (see Connect a custom domain).
How customers find it:
- Link it from your support footer, help center, and product navigation.
- Mention it in your first response to “is the site down?” inquiries.
- Embed the status widget on your main site so the URL is one click away.
3. Customers self-subscribe
On the public page, customers click Subscribe to Updates. They:
- Enter their email address.
- Choose to receive All events (every incident, including new ones) or specific incidents they pick from the current list.
- Click Subscribe.
Atender sends a confirmation email with a verification link. The customer clicks the link, and they’re subscribed. Verification keeps the list clean of typos and bad-faith subscriptions.
4. Manage existing subscribers
Go to Settings → Incidents Settings → Subscribers. You see:
- Total subscriber count
- Each subscriber’s email
- The scope they’re subscribed to (“All events” or a list of specific incident titles)
- When they subscribed
- A trash icon to delete the subscriber
You can’t add a subscriber from here — subscriptions are always self-service to keep consent clear. You can remove subscribers (e.g., bounced addresses, abuse cases).
5. Export the subscriber list
Click Export List in the top-right of the Subscribers tab. Atender generates a CSV with email, scope, and subscribe-at timestamps. Useful for compliance reviews or for one-off announcements outside the status page.
Verify it worked
- Open the public page in an incognito tab.
- Click Subscribe to Updates and enter a test email you control.
- Confirm you receive the verification email and click the link.
- In Settings → Incidents Settings → Subscribers, the new subscriber appears with the right scope and a fresh timestamp.
- (Optional) Create a test incident and confirm the subscriber receives the notification email from the sender address you configured.
Unsubscribing
Every subscriber email includes a one-click unsubscribe link. Atender honors unsubscribe immediately and silently — there’s no double-confirmation, no retention. Once unsubscribed, the subscriber can re-subscribe by going through the public-page flow again.
Troubleshooting
- Symptom: Subscribers aren’t receiving the verification email. Fix: Check spam folders first. If the verification email is missing, confirm the Subscriber email sender isn’t set to an email channel with an inactive domain (Settings → Email — domain status should be Active). Channels with a non-active domain are hidden from the dropdown, but if your channel went inactive after you set it, the system falls back to platform default until you re-select.
- Symptom: Subscriber says they’re getting too many emails. Fix: They might be subscribed to “All events” instead of specific incidents. They can change scope by unsubscribing and re-subscribing with the narrower scope, or by clicking the management link in any past email.
- Symptom: Subscribers aren’t getting incident updates, only the initial creation email. Fix: Each posted update on an incident sends an email to subscribers of that incident. If you posted an update but no email arrived, check the Subscribers tab — the subscriber may have been deleted, or the incident-scope subscription may not match.