Connect and manage on-call schedules in Slack

You can connect on-call schedules of your team to your team Slack channel and receive notifications about any changes to on-call shift changes. While connecting the on-call schedule with Slack, you can also set up an alias that can be used to tag or @mention the current on-call member.

What’s an alias?

An alias is a word you choose to tag the on-call person in a schedule. It starts with an exclamation mark (!) so common words like "hello" don’t trigger a notification by mistake.

Aliases can:

• Use only alphabets, numbers, hyphen (-), or underscore (_)

• Be 3 to 50 characters long

• Have no spaces

You can use the same alias for different schedules in multiple Slack channels.

For example, you can create an alias like !disturbed linked to your team's on-call and shadow schedules. When you type !disturbed in the channel, all responders are instantly tagged in the message.

Connect a schedule to a Slack channel

To link a schedule to your team's Slack channel,

• Run the command /jsmops oncall on the channel and click Connect schedule.

• Alternatively, you can run the command /jsmops connect schedule to start connecting the schedule.

To connect a schedule:

• Select the Jira Service Management site

• Select the schedule you want to connect. You can select up to 5 schedules to connect to a channel at once.

• Choose the type of notifications you want to receive in your team channel. Depending on your selection, notifications will be sent immediately whenever a shift starts or ends on the connected schedule.

• Optionally, you can create an alias for this schedule. Select the Create alias option, additional fields related to the alias will appear to fill.

To create an alias, fill the following fields:

• Message style: Choose how the bot should reply when someone uses an alias.
  It can reply in a thread under the message or post a new message in the channel.

• Auto-reply: You can set a message that the bot will automatically send when someone uses an alias. This is in addition to tagging the on-call member.

• Auto-reply when no one is on call: If someone uses the alias but no one is on call (based on the schedule), the bot will reply with a standard text. You can change this to a custom message if you want.

Edit a schedule connection

To edit a schedule connection or disconnect it from your team channel, follow these steps:

1. Run the command /jsmops oncall.

2. Use the Slack button to view connected schedules.

3. From the more options (…) menu of any schedule, select Edit or Disconnect.

4. Run the command /jsmops view connected schedules

What's a schedule alias?

A schedule alias is a word you can use to tag the current on-call person for a schedule. Instead of checking who’s on call or messaging the whole team, just type the alias in the channel. The Jira Service Management ChatOps bot will automatically reply and mention the right on-call person.

Best practices for alias

• Choose a simple and easy-to-remember word for your alias.

• Make sure it matches the purpose of the schedule. For example, if the schedule is for a support team, use an alias like !help or !support. This makes it clear and easy for others to use.

• Using the same alias for similar purposes across different team channels helps everyone remember it.
  If you have several support teams, using !help for all of them keeps things consistent and simple.

Frequently asked questions

Why isn’t the /jsmops whoisoncall command working the way it used to?

The /jsmops whoisoncall command has been modified. It now only shows the list of on-call members.

To view all on-call schedules, use the /jsmops all schedules command instead.

Why am I seeing new permissions on the Slack OAuth screen?

To enable new features when connecting a schedule, the bot needs additional permissions. These include the ability to read messages in public and private channels where the Jira Service Management ChatOps bot is added.

I'm already using AIOps features like incident summaries and timelines. Do I need to grant permissions again?

No. If you're already using AIOps features—such as incident summarization or timeline creation—through the Jira Service Management ChatOps bot, you do not need to re-grant message read permissions.

Will Atlassian read, store, or use Slack messages from my company’s workspace to train large language models (LLMs)?

It depends on how the Jira Service Management ChatOps bot is used. There are two key scenarios:

When an incident is linked to a Slack channel:
If you're using AIOps features—like incident summarization or timeline creation, and the bot is in a channel where exactly one incident is linked, then messages in that channel may be sent to LLMs. This is done only to support the summarization and timeline generation features.

When no incident is linked to the Slack channel:
If the ChatOps bot is a member of a channel without a linked incident, then:

• The bot may still receive message events (example: when someone posts a message), but messages are not sent to LLMs.

• In this case, it simply parses messages locally to check for known aliases and responds accordingly.

Will Atlassian read old messages in the channel once the bot is added?

No, the Jira Service Management ChatOps bot does not access or read any messages sent before it was added to the channel. Once the bot is added, Slack sends an event to our service every time a new message is posted in that channel.

Who can connect, edit, or delete schedule mappings to a channel?

Anyone in the Slack workspace with an Atlassian account can connect, edit, or delete schedule mappings to a channel.

What is an alias? Can I change the “!” to something else?

An alias is a keyword that links multiple schedules. For example, you can link your on-call and shadow schedules to an alias like “!disturbed.” When anyone types “!disturbed” in the Slack channel, the Jira Service Management ChatOps bot fetches the current on-call responders from both schedules and tags them in the channel.

I don’t want the chatbot to read my messages. What should I do?

You can remove the Jira Service Management ChatOps bot from the channel using any of the following Slack commands:

• /kick @Jira Service Management ChatOps

• /remove @Jira Service Management ChatOps

Why isn’t the user tagged in my Slack channel when I type an alias or oncall or whoisoncall command?

The user hasn't linked their Slack account to their Atlassian account. They can do this by using the /connect command in the Slack workspace.

Why doesn’t the website open when I click on the schedule or user profile link in the response?

Try holding Ctrl (or Cmd on Mac) and clicking the URL. This should open the link properly.

Why am I getting on-call change notifications even though I didn’t select them during setup?

Two possible reasons:

1. Multiple aliases with the same schedule may have different notification settings.

2. Someone may have edited the alias. Check the configuration.

If I make changes to JSM schedules, are they visible immediately?

Yes, if the schedules are connected to a Slack channel, any changes to on-call responders will be reflected across all workflows for this feature instantly.

Can I configure the auto-reply to first tag responders and then show my custom message?

No, there is no configuration available to change this behavior.

Why isn’t the auto-reply working?

Auto-reply won’t be sent if you use multiple aliases in a single message. However, a fallback message will be sent for each alias in the message.

For example, if you send a message like this in Slack:
Hi !disturbed !scrummaster !shadow, please check this alert and prioritize
There are 3 aliases, so auto-reply won’t be triggered. But, if 2 aliases have no on-call responders, fallback messages will be sent for those aliases, and on-call responders will be mentioned for the remaining alias.

How can I get the Jira Service Management ChatOps bot to respond to messages from other apps in my channel if they contain an alias?

Currently, this isn’t possible, but we’re working on a feature that will allow you to customize which app messages the Jira Service Management ChatOps bot can parse and reply to if an alias is present.

Will this feature work in private channels?

Yes, it will.