How a reply advances a card

With a mailbox connected, the replies to your applications move the right cards for you. Four of the seven categories carry evidence of a stage:

• An acknowledgement moves the card to Acknowledged.
• A response moves it to Responded.
• An interview invitation moves it to Interview.
• An offer moves it to Offer.

Job alerts and irrelevant mail never touch the pipeline. They are filed, and that is the whole of it.

Matching

A message is matched to one of your applications by the employer and the job title on each. If nothing fits, the message is still classified and filed, but no card moves — the Inbox page says Filed, no pipeline change.

Forward only

A card can only move further along the board. An acknowledgement arriving after an interview invitation changes nothing, because Acknowledged sits behind Interview. Stages can be skipped — an interview invitation for a card still sitting in Applied takes it straight to Interview — but nothing ever comes back the other way.

An email can never move a closed application. Rejected, Withdrawn and Removed are not offered to the matcher in the first place, and the advance rule refuses them outright even so. A card you have closed stays closed.

The first time an application reaches Applied or beyond this way, the applied date is stamped for you.

A rejection is never applied for you

A rejection is the one message that ends a conversation, and Rolehound will not act on it by itself. When one is recognised, the card stays exactly where it is and the message is flagged Needs confirmation.

The count appears on Overview, and the flag on the Inbox page. Open the message, read it, and press Confirm rejection if it is what it looks like. Only then does the application move to Rejected.

If it is not — a rejection for a different role, or a message that was simply misread — leave it. The card does not move, and nothing expires.

Seeing what moved

Every message on the Inbox page says what Rolehound did with it: advanced to a named stage, needs confirmation, or filed with no pipeline change. Each move is written to your audit trail as well, with the evidence behind it.

You can always move a card yourself, whatever the mail said — see advancing an application.