AI Actions
Enable your AI agent to perform real actions: look up orders, book appointments, create support tickets, and more, all through natural conversation.
10 min read
Updated February 2026
What are AI Actions?
AI Actions transform your AI Agent from a question-answering tool into a powerful assistant that can take real action on behalf of your customers. Instead of just providing information, your AI agent can:
- Look up order status from Shopify, WooCommerce, or BigCommerce
- Book appointments via Square, Calendly, or Google Calendar
- Create support tickets in Zendesk, Freshdesk, or HappyFox
- Check payment status through Stripe or PayPal
- Search MLS listings for real estate agents
- Hand off to live agents when needed
All of this happens through natural conversation. Customers simply ask for what they need, and the AI agent handles the rest.
How AI Actions Work
AI Actions use OpenAI's function calling capability to detect customer intent and execute the appropriate action in real-time:
- Intent Detection: The AI analyzes the customer's message to determine if they're asking for something that requires an action (e.g., “Where's my order?” or “I need to book an appointment”).
- Information Gathering: If additional details are needed (like an order number or email), the AI asks for them naturally.
- Action Execution: The AI calls the appropriate API (Shopify, Zendesk, Square, etc.) to perform the action.
- Response Delivery: Results are formatted and presented to the customer in a conversational way.
Supported Platforms
AI Actions are organized by category. Click any platform for detailed setup instructions and available actions.
E-commerce
| Platform | Actions | Use Cases |
|---|---|---|
| Shopify | 5 | Order status, tracking, inventory, product info |
| WooCommerce | 5 | Order status, tracking, inventory, product info |
| BigCommerce | 5 | Order status, tracking, inventory, product info |
Support & Helpdesk
| Platform | Actions | Use Cases |
|---|---|---|
| Zendesk | 5 | Create tickets, check status, search KB, live handoff |
| Freshdesk | 5 | Create tickets, check status, search KB, live handoff |
| HappyFox | 4 | Create tickets, check status, search KB |
Messaging, SMS & Live Chat
| Platform | Actions | Use Cases |
|---|---|---|
| Twilio | 7 | Send SMS/MMS, WhatsApp, phone lookup, booking confirmations, team alerts |
| Freshchat | 2 | Live agent handoff, create conversations |
| Intercom | 5 | Conversations, user info, notes, live handoff |
| HappyFox Chat | 2 | Agent availability, live handoff |
Payments
| Platform | Actions | Use Cases |
|---|---|---|
| Stripe | 3 | Payment status, invoices, charge history |
| PayPal | 3 | Transaction status, invoices, refund status |
CRM
| Platform | Actions | Use Cases |
|---|---|---|
| Salesforce | 4 | Contacts, leads, opportunities |
| HubSpot | 4 | Contacts, deals, records |
Booking & Scheduling
| Platform | Actions | Use Cases |
|---|---|---|
| Square | 1 (multi-step) | Full appointment booking with services, staff, payment |
| Calendly | 1 (multi-step) | Meeting scheduling with event types and calendar |
| Google Calendar | 4 (2 multi-step) | Direct calendar booking, availability, rescheduling, cancellation |
Real Estate
| Platform | Actions | Use Cases |
|---|---|---|
| CT IDX Pro+ | 1 | Real-time MLS listing search |
| Follow Up Boss | 2 | Lead creation, contact lookup |
Status & Monitoring
Status and monitoring actions let your AI agent answer questions about service health, active incidents, and scheduled maintenance. Customer-facing actions surface status directly in the chat widget. CoPilot actions let your internal team manage incidents and alerts without leaving the conversation.
| Platform | Actions | Use Cases |
|---|---|---|
| Statuspage | 6 | Service status, incidents, components, maintenance, email subscribe |
| Instatus | 5 | Service status, incidents, components, post updates |
| Betterstack | 5 | Uptime monitors, active incidents, status page summary |
| PagerDuty | 5 (CoPilot) | Active incidents, incident details, create incidents, add notes |
| Jira Service Management | 5 (CoPilot) | Alerts, on-call schedules, acknowledge alerts, create alerts |
| FireHydrant | 5 | Active incidents, create incidents, page on-call, add notes |
| Incident.io | 4 | Active incidents, create incidents, update status |
Enabling AI Actions
To enable AI Actions for your AI Agent:
- Go to AI Actions in your dashboard
- Browse the Library tab to see available actions
- Click Enable on the action you want to add
- Select which AI Agent(s) should have access to this action
- Enter your API credentials for the platform
- Click Save to activate
Each platform requires specific credentials (API keys, access tokens, etc.). See the individual platform guides for detailed setup instructions.
Response Types
AI Actions can return different response types depending on the situation:
| Type | When It's Used |
|---|---|
ai_action | Action completed successfully with results |
ai_action_step | Multi-step action in progress (shows options/forms) |
ai_action_confirm | Action needs user confirmation before proceeding |
ai_action_prompt | More information needed from the user |
ai_action_error | An error occurred during execution |
ai_action_cancelled | User cancelled the action |
Rate Limiting & Error Handling
To protect both your accounts and the external APIs, ChatSpark implements rate limiting on AI Actions:
- Per-conversation limits: Prevents abuse from single users
- Per-platform limits: Respects API provider rate limits
- Automatic retry: Failed requests are retried with backoff
- Graceful degradation: If an action fails, the AI provides helpful fallback responses