Sending photos and files in portal messages

Summary

Customers can attach photos and PDF files to messages they send through the portal — warning-light photos, damage shots, service-history PDFs, insurance documents. Attachments appear in the staff unified inbox alongside the text message, no work-around through WhatsApp needed.

This guide is mostly informational for staff to help answer questions from customers. Customers do not need a separate guide — the portal UI is self-explanatory.

What customers can attach

• Photos: JPEG, PNG, WebP, and iPhone HEIC (decoded to JPEG in the browser before upload).
• PDFs.
• Up to 10 MB per file, 25 MB total per message, and a maximum of 4 files per message.

Photos over about 1 MB are automatically compressed in the browser before upload, keeping mobile uploads under a second on a normal 4G signal. Compression preserves orientation (portrait shots stay portrait) and uses a quality floor that keeps service stamps and VIN plates legible. The customer does not need to do anything to opt in — it just happens.

Not supported in this version

• Video files — rejected with “Videos can’t be sent yet — try a photo or PDF”.

How customers attach

1. From the portal Messages page, the customer taps the paperclip Attach button next to the Send box.
2. The phone or browser file picker opens. On mobile, this includes “Take Photo” and the photo library directly.
3. They pick one or more files. Preview chips appear next to the message text:
   • Photos show a thumbnail.
   • PDFs show a document icon, filename, and size.
4. A small caption reads “Tap Send to attach these to your message” — files are staged but not yet sent.
5. They can tap ✕ on a chip to remove it, or tap Attach again to add more (up to 4).
6. They tap Send. Files upload, then the message goes through.

If text was empty, the message is recorded with the placeholder “[Photo attached]” so it shows correctly in the staff inbox and the customer’s thread.

What staff see

Attachments appear in the staff unified inbox in the same message bubble as the customer’s text. Each attachment is a thumbnail (for images) or a clickable file icon (for PDFs). Click to open or download.

Notes

• Attachment-only messages (no text) are now allowed — both for replies and to start a new conversation.
• Uploads are sequential per file (not parallel), to keep mobile uploads stable.
• Attachments do not cost AI credits. AI classification is skipped for attachment-only messages.

Troubleshooting

Problem: Customer says an iPhone photo will not upload. Cause: Most likely a network drop during the upload, or the photo is in an unusual format the in-browser decoder cannot read. Fix: Ask them to retry the upload. If it fails again, ask them to share the photo through their Photos app to themselves (e.g. via email) and re-upload the resulting copy - that re-encodes it through iOS into a standard JPEG.

Problem: Customer says “Videos can’t be sent yet”. Cause: Video uploads are not supported in this version. Fix: Ask them for a photo of the issue, or to upload to YouTube/iCloud and paste the link.

Problem: Customer says the file is too large. Cause: Either the file is over 10 MB, or the message would exceed 25 MB total, or they are trying to attach more than 4 files. Fix: Ask them to take a smaller photo (lower resolution), split a multi-page PDF, or send across multiple messages.

Problem: Upload chip turns red. Cause: The upload failed — usually a network drop on mobile. Fix: Customer can retry the chip directly. The text and other staged files are kept.