Team Chat
Team Chat is messaging for your staff: channels for the whole business, channels per location, private groups and direct messages.
It exists because crews were running handovers through an outside messaging app. The problem with that, in the words of the operator who asked for this:
if a boat was not filled up the night before, the opening staff will be aware.
A plain chat does not solve that. A note posted at 9pm is scrolled past by the person who arrives at 6am. That is why Team Chat has a pinned strip.
Team Chat and the Support Channel are different things
Both are chat. They do different jobs and share no data.
| Support Channel | Team Chat | |
|---|---|---|
| Scope | One channel per location | Business-wide, per location, private groups, and DMs |
| Slack link | Yes | No, deliberately |
| Purpose | Coordinating operations at a site | Crew handovers and general staff messaging |
There is also a third thing reachable from the same screen: Ask RT, which is your line to RentalTide support rather than a staff channel. Messages there reach our team. It is not a team channel and staff conversations never enter it.
Channels
The sidebar groups channels four ways. Group headings only appear when you have more than one kind.
| Kind | Heading | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| Business-wide | Everyone | Every staff member in the business |
| Per location | Locations | Everyone at that site |
| Private group | Groups | A named subset you pick |
| Direct message | Direct messages | One-to-one |
Each row shows an unread count, capped at 99+, and a bell-off icon when muted. Muted channels still count unread messages; they just stop notifying you. Direct messages sort by most recent activity rather than when they were created.
The channel header names who is in it, in plain language: "Everyone on staff", "Everyone at this location", "Just the two of you". It also shows who is online right now.
Who can do what
| Action | Who |
|---|---|
| Read and post in a channel you are in | Any staff member |
| Start a direct message | Any staff member |
| Mute a channel | Any staff member, for themselves only |
| Delete a message | Its author, or an admin |
| Create a channel, add or remove members | Owner, Admin |
| Retention and export | Owner, Admin |
The pinned strip
Pin a message and it sits in a highlighted strip at the top of the channel, above the scrollback, reading "1 pinned note" or "N pinned notes". It stays there until somebody unpins it.
Collapse it if it is in the way. It is expanded by default on purpose.
The strip works because it is short. Pin the things the next shift must see before they touch a boat: fuel not topped up, a unit out of service, a customer arriving early, a key moved.
Unpin it once it is dealt with. A strip with nine stale notes is scrolled past exactly like the chat it was meant to fix.
Threads, reactions, files and mentions
Threads keep a side conversation out of the main channel. Replies live in the thread panel and do not repeat in the channel; the parent shows a reply count. On a phone the thread replaces the message pane with a back arrow.
Reactions are emoji on hover. Click one that is already there to toggle yours off.
Files attach from the composer, up to ten per message.
Mentions pick from the staff in that channel.
Messages are marked read automatically once you have seen the newest one.
Staying current
Team Chat runs over a live connection, so messages, reactions, typing indicators and thread replies appear without refreshing. It reconnects by itself if the connection drops.
Retention and export
Owners and admins can set how long messages are kept and export a channel transcript to CSV from the archive icon in the channel header.
Worth setting deliberately. Staff chat accumulates operational detail, and a retention window you chose is easier to defend than one you never thought about.