---
title: Deciding an item
summary: A person allows or declines what the assistant or the online admin asks about. The first decision closes the item for everyone, only a person can make it, and an allowed action is carried out only if nothing changed while it waited.
tools: []
related: [waiting-for-you, item-kinds, waiting-push]
search: [approve, decline]
---

# Deciding an item

## Who decides

Only a person who is signed in on the web or in the app decides. A business key, a
program connected by a person's consent and the assistant itself cannot, because the
permission for the assistant is given by a person.

The first decision stands for everyone who sees the item. The same person repeating
it gets the same answer, and another decision on a closed item is refused. If someone
has already dealt with the item, the sheet says "This is no longer waiting: someone
already dealt with it".

## Allow or Don't

An item of an action shows **What the assistant will do**, in order, and the choice:

- **Allow** carries out the actions.
- **Don't** carries out nothing. The item moves to **Already decided** as not allowed.

In the app the item opens a sheet from **Waiting for you**. When the assistant asks in
a conversation, the decision card there has **Allow**. An action that deletes
something for good asks twice: "Delete for good? It can't be brought back."

## Why the assistant asks

The item says why, in one line, by the kind of the action:

- An action that cannot be undone is confirmed twice.
- An action that reaches outside Talemo, and an action that gives someone access, are
  always asked about.
- Changes to the knowledge are always asked about, because clients get answers from
  it.
- An action that changes many records at once, such as days of a schedule or a group
  of contacts, is asked about even when the person chose to be asked only about what
  matters.
- Other actions are asked about when the person chose that the assistant asks about
  every action (see [Assistant mode](../assistant/assistant-mode.md)).

The online admin has a short list of its own. It cannot, for example, cancel a visit
by itself and only asks.

## What happens after Allow

The assistant carries out the same actions with the same values. Before that Talemo
shows them again and compares: if the free time or the visit changed while the item
waited, nothing is done. The item says how it ended:

- "Done." or "The assistant is doing it." while it runs.
- "Not done: things changed while it waited. Ask the assistant again."
- "It isn't known whether it was done: the assistant stopped halfway. Check it."

An action that was carried out before a later one failed is not undone.

## When the person has no right

Talemo checks each action of the item under the rights of the person who decides. When
one of them is not allowed, the person sees "You don't have access to this action.
Someone who has access can allow it", the item stays open, and nothing is carried out.
The allowed actions run with the rights of the person who allowed them, within what the
assistant was given.

## Other items

Handoffs, cases and notices have no decision (see [Kinds of items](item-kinds.md)).
A draft reply is decided with **Send**, **Edit** or **Don't send** (see
[Draft replies of the online admin](../conversations/draft-replies.md)).