When building a Zobot on the SalesIQ Scripts platform, errors generally fall into one of two categories: those that stop you saving the script, and those that occur once the bot is actually running.

Save errors

A save error prevents your script from being saved at all, and is most commonly caused by incorrect syntax or an issue with how a variable has been declared. These need to be resolved before you can save your progress, so working through them methodically, checking brackets, quotation marks, and variable names first, usually clears the majority of save errors.

Runtime errors

A runtime error occurs while the script is actually executing, typically caused by an action the bot attempted that wasn't valid in that specific situation, such as trying to reference data that doesn't exist yet at that point in the conversation.

Understanding the four handlers

Since SalesIQ Scripts bots are built across four separate handlers, knowing which handler an error originates in is often the fastest way to diagnose it.

• Trigger handler. Runs when a visitor matches your configured trigger criteria.
• Message handler. Runs when a visitor initiates chat directly, checking for existing context and collecting inputs from their message.
• Context handler. Takes the responses collected by the message handler and performs the intended action.
• Failure handler. Runs when an action returned by another handler fails to execute, such as attempting to forward a chat to an operator who isn't available.

Using the Failure Handler to catch problems gracefully

The Failure Handler is disabled by default, but enabling it lets you write specific responses for known failure scenarios, using an error code passed into the handler to identify the exact cause, such as being outside business hours or having no operators currently available. Without a Failure Handler configured, a fallback simply forwards the chat to department operators.