> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.tranthor.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Contact Controls

> Set how often your AI agents can contact each customer, and what they are allowed to send.

Contact controls are the **operating limits** for your [engagement team](/guide/engagement-team). You set them once for the workspace. Every message an agent wants to send is checked against them immediately before it is delivered.

<Note>
  Operating limits govern **agent-originated sends only**. Broadcasts you send yourself, journeys you build by hand, and messages sent through the API behave exactly as they did before. They are never capped, blocked, or counted by the policy, even when your workspace has one.
</Note>

## Open the limits

Go to **Agents** in the sidebar. The **Approved Operating Limits** card shows your current policy, its version, and one of these states:

* **Unconfigured**: no policy has been adopted yet.
* **Manual Review Only (Drafts)**: agents prepare drafts and a person approves each one.
* **Autonomous Sends Approved**: eligible objectives may send without per-campaign approval.

Select **Configure Limits** to open **Configure Operating Limits**. Select **Edit limits with AI** if you would rather describe the limits in plain language. The suggestion is added to your draft, and nothing takes effect until you review it and save.

## Operating limits

| Setting | What it does | Allowed values |
| - | - | - |
| **Max contacts per 7 days** | Per customer, across marketing campaigns | 1 to 14 |
| **Hours between contacts** | Wait at least this long before the next message | 12 to 168 |
| **Holdout group (%)** | Share of customers held back to measure impact | 0 to 50 |
| **Maximum discount (%)** | Largest discount an agent can use in an offer | 0 to 100 |
| **Recipients per campaign** | Cap on how many people one campaign can reach | Whole number, or blank for no cap |
| **Total sends per day** | Cap across the whole workspace | Whole number, or blank for no cap |

### Audience and channels

* **Permitted Channels**: choose **Email**, **SMS**, or both. WhatsApp is not available to agents yet.
* **Permitted Audience Segments**: with nothing selected, any eligible customer can be contacted. Select segments to limit agents to those audiences only.

### Email design freedom

Choose how much freedom agents have when designing emails. Approved headers, footers, and brand styling stay protected at every level, and design freedom never grants permission to send. See [Brand and email design](/guide/brand-and-email-design).

### Approval and sending

* **Owner Policy Approval**: switch this on to approve the limits, channels, audience permissions, and message programs when you save. An **Active** policy cannot be saved without it.
* **Policy Lifecycle State**: **Active** enforces the limits and requires owner approval. **Draft** is for simulation.
* **Approve Autonomous Sending**: when off, agents prepare drafts for human review. When on, eligible objectives may send automatically within the limits.

<Warning>
  Approving autonomous sending does not remove every review step. Email campaigns built from an approved email design still need a person to review them before they send, and an objective must meet additional conditions before it can send on its own. See [Engagement team](/guide/engagement-team#when-an-objective-can-send-on-its-own).
</Warning>

If the card shows **Uncovered delivery paths detected**, automatic sending is suspended until every enabled marketing channel is covered.

## Message programs

The **Message programs** tab holds reusable messages and offers for your agents. Use **Add Program** to create one, and review the full message and brand layout before you approve it. Changes apply when you save the operating limits.

A program can carry no offer, an informational offer, a percentage or fixed discount, or a custom offer. A percentage discount cannot be higher than the **Maximum discount** you set.

## Hours between contacts is not quiet hours

The card labels the minimum gap between messages as **Quiet Cooldown**. It stops the same customer from being contacted twice too close together, but it does not stop sending at night.

If you need to avoid certain times of day, use **quiet hours** instead. Quiet hours are a send setting on individual journeys, with a start and end time, the days they apply to, and a timezone. They are separate from the operating limits.

## Related

* [Engagement team](/guide/engagement-team): objectives, proposals, and when agents can send on their own.
* [Brand and email design](/guide/brand-and-email-design): how agents design emails within your brand.
* [Dashboard Home and AI Copilot](/guide/dashboard-home-ai-copilot): approve pending proposals from Home.


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