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When an incident pages you, two actions decide what happens next: acknowledging the page stops further escalation; handing off transfers the lead to another team member.
Acknowledgment panel

Acknowledge and handoff controls on the incident detail page

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Acknowledging an incident

Acknowledging tells scaling.cloud you are on it. It does two things:
  1. Cancels the next escalation timeout — scaling.cloud will not page the next layer of the escalation policy.
  2. Records who took the page — your user is recorded as the acknowledger on the incident’s audit trail.
Acknowledging does not change the incident’s status. The incident stays in investigating (or whichever status it is in) until you progress it to identified, monitoring, or resolved.

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Where you can acknowledge

Acknowledgment is idempotent. Calling acknowledge on an incident that is already acknowledged returns success without doing anything; calling acknowledge on a resolved incident is a no-op.

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Acknowledging from your phone, no app

If you’re paged on a contact method, you can acknowledge without opening scaling.cloud at all:
  • Reply to the SMS. Every SMS page ends with Or reply <CODE> to ack. Text that short code back from the verified number that was paged and the incident acknowledges — escalation stops. The reply only works from your own verified number, and the code stops working once the page is acknowledged or escalation has already moved past your layer. An unknown or stale code is ignored.
  • Answer the voice call. Answering the automated call acknowledges it — there’s no keypress. If the call goes to voicemail it’s recorded as delivery only, and escalation continues to the next layer.
Both phone paths converge on the same acknowledgment as the dashboard and API — they cancel the escalation timer and record you as the acknowledger on the audit trail. Acknowledging is always reversible by handing off.

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Handing off an incident

If you can’t take a page — you are heads-down on another incident, off duty, or out of context — hand it off to someone else. The handoff:
  1. Updates the lead of the incident to the target user.
  2. Pages the target user through the same notification channels (email, Slack).
  3. Records the handoff on the audit trail with both the previous and new lead.
The target user must be a member of your organization. You cannot hand off to someone outside the org.

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Handing off from the dashboard

1

Open the incident

Navigate to the incident detail page and find the Escalation panel.
2

Choose a recipient

In the handoff form, select another org member from the list.
3

Submit

Click Hand off. The new lead is paged immediately and you stop receiving escalation pings.

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Handing off via the API

A handoff resets escalation back to a single notified responder — the new lead. If the new lead doesn’t acknowledge within the current layer’s ackTimeoutMinutes, escalation resumes from where it left off.

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Audit trail

Both actions are recorded on the incident’s paging audit trail with the actor, timestamp, and (for handoffs) the previous and new lead. The audit trail is available on the incident detail page and via the API on the incident record.
Acknowledge first, even if you plan to hand off. Acknowledging stops the escalation clock and gives you a moment to figure out who is the right next person.