How to reply to feedback in the customer's language

Reply in the language they wrote in

When a customer writes in Portuguese, reply in Portuguese. This sounds obvious, but it is easy to miss when your inbox mixes messages from several countries and your own working language is English. A reply in the wrong language can feel like a brush-off, even when the content is right, because the customer has to work harder to understand what you meant.

The rule is simple: match the language of the message. If the message mixes languages, use the language of the main request, and keep technical terms in the form the customer used. If you cannot read the language at all, say so in the language you can write in, and ask for the detail you need in a form you can understand.

How to detect the language without guessing

Start with the message itself. Two or three full sentences are usually enough to tell Portuguese from Spanish or English, and a short scan of common words is more reliable than a guess from the name or the country. A name like Ana or Lucas does not tell you the language of the message, and a country code only tells you where the request came from.

Use these signals in order:

1. The message text. Read the first sentence, which is where most people state the language they are most comfortable in.
2. The page the message came from. A feedback form on the Portuguese version of your site suggests a Portuguese message, although customers sometimes switch.
3. The page URL and the browser stored with the item. These help when the message is very short, such as "não funciona" or "bug".
4. Any locale you passed yourself. If your app sends the user's language through identify, the value is stored as metadata, so check it there.

If the signals disagree, reply in the language of the message and keep it short. You can always ask which language they prefer in a single line.

Short templates in English

Keep templates short. A reply in a second language should be easier to read than the original, not a translation of a long essay.

Hi Sam, thanks for the report about the export button. I can reproduce it on Chrome, and I am checking the change we made last week. I will write again by Friday with what I find.

For a request that you have decided to plan:

Hi Sam, thanks for asking for a shared folder. I have recorded it and planned it for the next release. I will tell you when it ships, so you do not have to check back.

Short templates in Portuguese

Write Portuguese replies yourself, using the form of address that fits your brand. These examples use a friendly, direct tone and the "você" form, which is common in Brazil.

Oi, Camila, obrigado por avisar sobre o botão de exportar. Consigo reproduzir o problema no Chrome e estou verificando a mudança que fizemos semana passada. Vou te escrever de novo até sexta-feira com o que encontrar.

For a request that was recorded and is not yet planned:

Oi, Camila, obrigado por pedir uma pasta compartilhada. Já registrei o pedido junto com outros parecidos. Ainda não consigo dizer quando vamos fazer, mas vou te avisar assim que tomarmos essa decisão.

For a message where you need one detail:

Oi, Camila, obrigado pela mensagem. Para investigar, preciso saber em qual página você estava e qual navegador usou. Pode me enviar essas informações respondendo este e-mail?

Use translation carefully

Machine translation is useful for two things: reading a message you cannot understand, and checking that your own wording is clear. It is risky for anything you send. Translation tools often change meaning in small ways, such as turning "we are checking" into "we will check" or softening a refusal into a maybe.

The safe workflow looks like this:

Do	Do not
Read the original message with a translation tool, then reply in your own words	Paste your English reply into a translator and send the result
Keep the customer's product names and feature words as they wrote them	Translate a feature name that appears in your interface
Check dates, numbers and promises by hand	Let a tool convert a date format or currency without checking
Ask a native speaker on the team to read important replies	Send a refund, outage or apology message you have not read yourself
Keep the original message quoted in your internal note	Lose the original wording when you summarize

Keep the original customer text in the item, and write your internal note in your team's working language so teammates can follow it. The note is private, so it does not need to be translated for the customer.

When the language is unclear

Sometimes the message is one word, or a string of symbols, or a mix of languages you cannot read. Do not guess and send a long reply. Send one short line in the language you are most sure of, with the detail you need. For example, "Hi, thanks for the message. Could you tell me which page you were on when this happened?" is clear in English and easy to answer even with a translator's help.

If the item is unclear and you cannot reach the sender, note what you found and set the status to new or closed. A note that says the language was unclear and the message was too short to act on is more useful than a wrong reply.

Recording the language in Escuta Produto

In Escuta Produto, the language of the form is not stored on the item, so the message text is the best source of truth. The widget supports English and Portuguese, and the hosted page takes a language parameter, but neither one writes the language to the item. If you need the language in your records, pass it yourself with identify, for example as a locale key, and it will be stored as metadata with the item.

Write each reply from your own email to the address on the item. Escuta Produto does not send automatic emails, so the wording is yours to check. For the wider reply patterns, including how to handle bugs, ideas and praise, read how to reply to customer feedback. The form options for language and the hosted page are in the widget docs and the hosted page docs, and the general collection setup is covered in how to collect customer feedback.