Back to Cookbook

Vendor Stale Ticket Escalation

Stop silent stalls — nudge vendors and keep residents informed

Vendors go quiet. Residents get frustrated. This recipe detects stalled maintenance tickets, follows up with vendors on a schedule, escalates to backups when needed, and keeps residents informed with honest ETAs throughout.

House RecipeWork5 min

INGREDIENTS

✉️Email

PROMPT

Create an OpenClaw recipe that detects and resolves stalled maintenance tickets: - After vendor assignment, monitor for response/status change - If stalled X business hours: send vendor follow-up with ticket context - If still stalled after Y hours: escalate to secondary vendor or PM supervisor - Send resident updates with realistic ETAs at every step - Include anti-spam limits and audit logging - Handle edge cases: phone-only vendors, parts backorders, scope disputes Vendor follow-up: "Reminder: Ticket #{{ticket_id}} ({{issue}}) at {{unit}} is waiting on schedule confirmation. Reply with ETA or available windows today." My PM system is: [AppFolio / Buildium / other]

How It Works

Once a ticket is assigned to a vendor, this recipe watches the clock. If no

response or status change comes within X business hours, it sends a follow-up.

Still nothing after Y hours? It escalates to a secondary vendor or PM supervisor.

The resident gets transparent updates at every step — including "still waiting on

the vendor" when that's the truth.

What You Get

  • Auto-follow-up with vendors after configurable stall window
  • Escalation to secondary vendor list or PM supervisor
  • Resident updates with realistic ETAs (even "still pending")
  • Anti-spam limits: bounded follow-up frequency
  • Full audit log of every follow-up touch
  • Special handling for parts backorders, phone-only vendors, and scope disputes

Setup Steps

  1. Connect your ticketing system, SMS/email, and vendor contacts
  2. Set stall detection windows per severity (e.g., Emergency: 2h, Urgent: 8h, Routine: 24h)
  3. Define your secondary vendor list per trade
  4. Configure anti-spam limits (max follow-ups per ticket)
  5. Set resident update frequency for long-running tickets

Tips

  • Some vendors only answer the phone — create a "call vendor" task instead of messaging
  • For parts backorders, change ticket state and schedule resident updates every N days
  • Route scope or price disputes to an approval workflow before re-scheduling
  • Keep follow-up messages short and action-oriented: "Reply with ETA or available windows"
  • Review stall patterns monthly to identify unreliable vendors
Tags:#property-management#maintenance#vendor-management#sla#automation