After hours: the Facebook comment reply template
A catch-all rule you switch on at closing and off in the morning, plus the Telegram alert that actually covers the night. Mentbot has no schedule field on a rule, and this page says so rather than implying a timer that does not exist.
Two-thirds of comments on a selling Page arrive outside working hours. The goal is not to answer them — it is to stop the commenter leaving before you can.
Checked against the product on
When this fires
Paste these into the rule’s keyword list. Any one of them matching is enough — keywords are an OR list, not an AND list.
hellohiopenare you openstill openanyone thereilang orasเปิดอยู่ไหม
How Mentbot reads them
- Matching is a plain substring test, not a whole-word test. A keyword matches anywhere inside the comment — which is why the list below matters.
- Case is ignored, and text is NFKC-folded first, so ＳＡＬＥ matches sale and full-width or styled characters still match.
- Thai, emoji and any other script work the same way: the comment is compared as text, with no language detection.
- Leading and trailing spaces in a keyword are trimmed, and a blank keyword row never matches anything.
The public reply
Add these as separate reply variants on the rule. Mentbot picks one at random each time a comment matches, so the same post does not fill up with one identical sentence.
- Variant 1
Thanks for the message! 🌙 We're closed right now and open at 9am — we'll reply first thing. Details in your inbox meanwhile.
- Variant 2
We've seen this ✅ Team's back at 9am and you're first in the queue. We've sent you the basics in Messenger.
- Variant 3
Outside our hours right now 😴 Someone will reply by 9am — check your Messenger, we've sent prices and shipping in the meantime.
{comment} is replaced with the commenter’s own text. It is the only token Mentbot substitutes — there is no {name} or {page}.
The Messenger DM
The private reply Mentbot sends to the same commenter. On Facebook this is a Messenger private reply to the comment, so it only works while Facebook’s reply window for that comment is open.
Hi! Thanks for commenting: "{comment}" We're closed at the moment — back at 9am, and we answer messages in order. While you wait, the things people usually ask: • Prices: from $19 • Shipping: $5 flat, free over $50 • COD available Reply here and it'll be waiting for us in the morning.
Settings to turn on
The four switches on the rule, and what this scenario needs from each.
| Setting | This template | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Reply once | On On. One "we're closed" per person per post. Someone leaving three comments at midnight does not want three identical apologies. | Answers each commenter once per post for this rule — and an attempt Facebook refused still counts as that once. The same person commenting again on the same post gets nothing more from this rule, but a different rule can still answer them, and the same rule answers them again on a different post. |
| Mention the commenter | Off | Puts an @mention of the commenter at the front of the public reply. It applies to the public reply only, never to the Messenger message. |
| Hide the comment | Off | Hides the comment once this rule has answered it. The author and their friends still see it; everyone else does not. Separate from your Page’s moderation filters, which run earlier. |
| Like the comment | Off Off. A like at 2am from a Page that just said it was closed reads oddly. | Likes the comment from the Page, straight after the public reply goes out. |
Scope
Where the rule is allowed to fire.
No keywords and no post list — a catch-all that answers anything the more specific rules did not.
A true catch-all: no keywords and no post list. It is rank 1 — the lowest — so every keyword rule and every post-scoped rule you have still wins over it. That is what makes a catch-all safe to leave in place: it only answers what nothing else did.
When two rules could both answer
Exactly one rule answers a comment. Mentbot ranks every rule that qualifies and runs the most specific one; the rest are recorded as outranked, not run.
- A rule limited to a list of posts wins first — even if it also has keywords.
- Then a rule with a hashtag or keywords.
- Then the catch-all with neither.
- If two rules tie on that rank, the older one wins. There is no priority field to set.
What will not match
Comments a seller expects this rule to catch, and does not. Each one follows from the matching rules above.
| The comment | Why it does not fire |
|---|---|
| Anything one of your other rules also matches | A catch-all is the lowest of the three specificity ranks. A keyword or hashtag rule beats it, and a post-scoped rule beats both. Exactly one rule answers each comment, so at night your price rule still answers price questions and this one picks up the rest. |
| Comments that arrive after you forget to switch it off | The inverse problem, and the honest one: there is no schedule, no active-hours field and no delay on a rule. It is on until you turn it off, so a rule left running will tell Tuesday lunchtime customers that you are closed. |
| An emoji-only comment, with the emoji-only moderation filter on | The catch-all itself answers stickers and emoji-only comments — it has no keywords to fail. The emoji-only moderation filter is what stops them: it hides them before any rule runs. |
| Anything your moderation filters caught | Channel moderation runs before rules and stops the comment there. Overnight spam hidden by the URL or phone filter never reaches this rule, which is the correct outcome. |
What Mentbot will not do here
Stated plainly, so you do not build a workflow on top of something that is not there.
- There is no schedule or delay field on a rule anywhere in Mentbot. You enable this rule at close and disable it in the morning — or leave a gentler always-on version running and accept that it speaks during the day too.
- The only thing in the product that runs on a clock is the Telegram unread alert: it tells you when a conversation has been sitting unanswered past a wait time you pick — any of 5, 15, 30, 60, 120 or 240 minutes, and you can pick several. That is what actually covers the night, because it wakes a human rather than pretending a robot answered.
- Mentbot does not know your timezone or your opening hours. Any hours quoted in the reply are text you wrote.
Cost at your comment volume
Rules are not metered separately — you pay for comments handled per day across all your Pages, and every plan includes every feature. Prices come straight from the pricing page.
| Comments per day | Plan | Monthly |
|---|---|---|
| 100 | Basic | $9 |
| 1,000 | Pro | $19 |
| 3,000 | Premium | $29 |
Unlimited Pages on every plan, and a 14-day free trial.
Questions
Can I schedule a rule to run only between 6pm and 9am?
No. There is no time-window field on a rule — the only state a rule has is on or off. This is a real limitation and the reason this page recommends a rule you toggle manually rather than one that claims to know the time.
Then what actually covers overnight comments?
Two things together. The catch-all rule stops the commenter feeling ignored, and the Telegram unread alert tells you in the morning — or during the night, if you pick a short wait time — which conversations are still waiting. The alert carries the oldest unread duration, the count, and links into the inbox.
Will the after-hours rule override my other rules?
It is the other way round. The catch-all is the least specific rule there is, so anything with keywords, a hashtag or a post list wins over it. You can leave it switched on without it swallowing your good rules.
When does the Telegram alert fire?
When the oldest unread conversation has waited past one of the thresholds you picked: 5, 15, 30, 60, 120 or 240 minutes. Pick several and you get an alert at each. It pauses once your daily comment quota is used up.
Other templates
Related guide
The long-form version of this, and the tool comparisons.
Every behaviour on this page is checked against Mentbot’s own source. If the product changes and this page does not, tell us.