Once your mailbox is connected, you write emails right on the lead. This page covers the composer, replying from the timeline, attachments and drafts.

**Contents**
- [Writing an email](#writing-an-email)
- [Replying from the timeline](#replying-from-the-timeline)
- [Attachments](#attachments)
- [Drafts and minimizing](#drafts-and-minimizing)
- [Emails on the timeline](#emails-on-the-timeline)
- [When incoming emails appear](#when-incoming-emails-appear)

## Writing an email

Open a lead and click **Email**. The composer opens with the lead's address in the **To** field; below it you see which address the email will be sent from.

- Fill in **Subject** and **Message** as usual. You can format the message: bold, italic, underline, lists, links and font sizes.
- **Cc** and **Bcc** reveal additional recipient fields - separate multiple addresses with commas.
- **Send** delivers the email through your mailbox. It then appears as an entry on the lead's timeline and sits in the sent folder of your mailbox - called "Sent Items" in Outlook and "Sent" in Gmail.

## Replying from the timeline

Email entries on the timeline show a reply arrow on hover (**Reply**). It opens the composer in reply mode:

- The subject is prefilled with "Re:" and the recipient is the other side of the original email.
- For the recipient, your answer stays in the same email thread - just as if you had replied straight from your mailbox.
- The previous conversation is automatically included below your reply, with both providers. The recipient sees your text and the quoted thread underneath it - the way they know it from their own mail client.

## Attachments

Use **Attach** to add files. Two limits apply:

- All attachments of one email may total at most 20 MB.
- Executable files are blocked for security reasons - for example .exe, .bat, .js or .msi. Documents, images, PDFs and archives like .zip work fine.

## Drafts and minimizing

The composer does not have to be finished in one go:

- **Minimize** shrinks it to a bar at the bottom of the screen - you can keep navigating through inDeal and reopen it anytime.
- What you have written is saved automatically as a draft - even if you close the composer.
- An existing draft is marked with a small dot on the **Email** button (**Draft available**). Next time you open it, everything is back.
- **Discard** deletes the draft, including uploaded attachments, for good.

## Emails on the timeline

Email entries on the timeline show at a glance what happened:

- An arrow shows the direction: incoming or outgoing, along with "From" or "To" and the other side's address.
- The subject is the entry's title.
- If several messages belong to one conversation, a counter shows how many (for example "3 messages"). Collapsed, you see the latest message; **Show more** expands the whole thread.
- Attachments appear as clickable chips - expanded, they are grouped per message with direction and date.

## When incoming emails appear

inDeal checks your mailbox for new messages every two minutes. A reply from your lead therefore shows up on the timeline within a few minutes of arriving - provided the sender's address belongs to an existing lead.