Purpose
Turn raw inbound support inquiries into structured, routable classifications — tagged by topic, urgency, and required expertise — so tickets reach the right handler on the first pass and time-sensitive requests never sit in a general queue. Eliminates manual triage guesswork and inconsistent routing across agents.
When to Use
Invoke this skill when the user asks to:
- Classify or triage a batch of inbound support tickets or emails
- Route retirement, benefits, or HR inquiries to the correct team or specialist
- Prioritize a support backlog by urgency and complexity
- Flag inquiries that require escalation, compliance review, or licensed-specialist handling
- Build or standardize a support routing taxonomy for a CX team
- Identify which inquiries can be self-served or auto-responded vs. handled by a person
Inputs Required
Before starting, collect:
- Inquiry content: The text of one or more inquiries (email body, chat log, ticket description, or voicemail transcript)
- Support team structure: Which teams, tiers, or specialists exist as routing destinations (e.g., Tier 1, benefits specialist, retirement/rollover desk, compliance)
- Topic domain: Retirement, health benefits, general HR, payroll, or a mix
- Urgency signals to honor: Any account-specific triggers that make an inquiry high-priority (e.g., deadline-bound distributions, life events, complaints)
- Escalation rules: What must automatically escalate (regulatory complaints, legal threats, fraud indicators)
- Volume: Single inquiry or batch (and if batch, how many)
- Output preference: Single classification card vs. a batch routing table
If team structure or escalation rules are missing, apply a standard three-tier model (Self-serve → Tier 1 agent → Specialist/Escalation) and flag the assumption.
Instructions
Step 1: Extract the Core Request
For each inquiry, isolate what the customer actually needs — not just what they wrote. Strip pleasantries and identify:
- Primary intent (the one action or answer they want)
- Secondary intents (any additional asks buried in the message)
- Stated deadline or time reference ("before the 15th," "my last day is Friday")
- Emotional tone (neutral, frustrated, distressed, threatening)
Step 2: Assign a Topic Category
Classify into one primary topic and, if applicable, one sub-topic. Use this domain taxonomy (adapt to the provided domain):
- Account Access & Admin: logins, password resets, statements, address/beneficiary updates
- Contributions & Elections: enrollment, contribution changes, deferral rates, plan elections
- Distributions & Withdrawals: rollovers, hardship withdrawals, loans, RMDs, terminations
- Investment & Fund Questions: allocation changes, fund performance, fee questions
- Life & Employment Events: new hire, termination, retirement, leave, death/beneficiary claims
- Billing & Payroll: deductions, corrections, reimbursements
- Complaints & Disputes: service failures, error resolution, regulatory complaints
- General Information: policy clarification, "how does X work" questions
Step 3: Score Urgency (Tier 1–4)
Assign an urgency tier using both time-sensitivity and impact:
- Tier 1 — Critical (act same day): deadline within 48 hours, financial harm in progress, fraud, regulatory complaint, or acute distress
- Tier 2 — High (act within 1 business day): deadline within 5 business days, life event with a filing window, blocked from a required action
- Tier 3 — Standard (act within 3 business days): routine change requests with no immediate deadline
- Tier 4 — Low (act within 5 business days or self-serve): general information, non-blocking questions
State the specific signal that drove the tier — never assign a tier without naming the reason.
Step 4: Determine Required Expertise
Match the inquiry to the minimum handler capable of resolving it:
- Self-serve: answerable by a knowledge-base article or automated reply
- Tier 1 agent: standard account actions, no judgment or regulatory exposure
- Specialist: requires domain expertise (rollover mechanics, RMD calculations, plan-specific rules)
- Compliance/Escalation: regulatory complaint, legal language, fraud, or anything requiring documented review
Step 5: Set Routing Destination and Priority
Combine topic + urgency + expertise into a single routing decision:
- Name the destination (map to the team structure provided)
- Assign a priority score (Urgency Tier is primary sort; expertise breaks ties)
- Raise any escalation flags triggered by the escalation rules or Step 1 tone signals
- Note whether a suggested first response (acknowledgment, deadline confirmation) should fire immediately
Step 6: Summarize the Classification
Produce the classification card (single) or routing table (batch) per the output format below.
Output Format
- Structure: For a single inquiry, one classification card. For a batch, a routing table with one row per inquiry plus a summary of tier counts and any escalations.
- Length: ~120–180 words per classification card; batch table scales to inquiry count, followed by a 3–4 line summary
- Format: Structured card (labeled fields) for singles; table for batches
- Sections: Extracted Request → Topic → Urgency Tier (+ reason) → Required Expertise → Routing Destination → Priority Score → Escalation Flags → Suggested Immediate Action
- Tone: Operational and decisive — a triage lead making routing calls, not hedging. Every field resolves to a concrete value.
Quality Checklist
Before delivering output, verify:
- [ ] Every inquiry has a topic, urgency tier, expertise level, and routing destination — no field left blank
- [ ] Each urgency tier names the specific signal that justified it (deadline, distress, fraud, etc.)
- [ ] Routing destinations map to the team structure provided — no invented teams
- [ ] Every inquiry matching an escalation rule carries an escalation flag
- [ ] Secondary intents buried in multi-part inquiries are captured, not dropped
- [ ] For batches, the summary reports the count per urgency tier and lists all escalations
Notes
- When tone signals distress or a complaint, upgrade urgency by one tier even if the topic seems routine — emotional escalation predicts churn and formal complaints.
- Deadline-bound distributions (RMDs, hardship windows, termination rollovers) are the most common source of missed SLAs in benefits queues — treat any stated date as a hard trigger.
- If an inquiry is genuinely ambiguous between two topics, classify to the higher-expertise destination; over-routing costs less than a misrouted specialist ticket bouncing back.
- For recurring batch classification, note repeated topics with high volume — these are candidates for self-serve content or automated responses.
How to use this skill
This file is a Claude Code skill in Anthropic's standard format — markdown with YAML frontmatter at the top.
Installing in Claude Code:
~/.claude/skills/<folder-name>/SKILL.md— auto-loads in every session anywhere on your machine (recommended for skills you'll use across multiple projects)<your-project>/.claude/skills/<folder-name>/SKILL.md— auto-loads only when working in that project (recommended for project-specific skills)
Restart Claude Code or open a new session to register.
Using in Claude.ai, ChatGPT, Gemini, or other AI tools:
- Drag this file into a new chat, or copy and paste its contents
- Send your task or request as your next message — the AI will apply the skill where it fits
For Claude Code skill details: https://docs.anthropic.com/en/docs/claude-code/skills