Every 10 minutes

Hear when your incidents change

You get an email when an incident assigned to you is updated, with what changed.

Runs: Every 10 minutes
Apps: ServiceNow
AI: Not needed
Access: read

Send this to your assistant

Create a ClickRuntime automation: every 10 minutes, check for ServiceNow incidents assigned to me that were updated, and email me the incident number, new state and latest comment.

Paste it into your assistant. It tells you what it will send or change before it runs live.

Add to ChatGPT Add to Claude

First time? Adding ClickRuntime to your assistant takes about two minutes.

Why use it

Why teams use this automation

When you raise an incident in ServiceNow, you expect to hear when something happens: the technician accepts it, it moves to In Progress, it is resolved. Often the notifications are routed to an email address that is rarely checked, or are switched off in the instance. People then chase their own tickets by logging in, or by messaging the service desk to ask, and a resolved incident waits for the requester to close it because they never noticed it was resolved.

Every ten minutes the automation queries ServiceNow for incidents assigned to you that have been updated since the last check, and emails you a summary of what changed, such as state, priority or assignment. You hear about changes without logging in. Engineers, managers and requesters who own incidents use it as their own personal change feed.

What you get out of it

No more checking the portal
You are told when state changes, so you stop refreshing the incident list. Time that went to checking goes back to the work the incident is blocking. Refreshing the incident list every half hour stops, and the time goes back to the blocked work.
Resolved incidents get confirmed
When an incident moves to Resolved, you see it quickly and can confirm the fix. Incidents then close on time rather than lingering, which keeps the open count accurate. An incident sitting in Resolved because the requester never noticed can be confirmed and closed the same day.
Reassignments do not go unnoticed
If an incident you are responsible for is moved to another group or priority, you find out within minutes. You can step in if it was reassigned by mistake. If your incident is moved to another group or priority without notice, the email tells you within ten minutes.
Clear history of changes
Each email lists what changed and when, which helps if a dispute arises about who did what. It forms a personal log next to the work notes in ServiceNow. If someone later disputes who changed the state, the dated emails provide a personal timeline beside the work notes.
Works without instance configuration
Setting up notification rules in ServiceNow requires admin rights. This approach needs only a user who can read incidents, so anyone can get alerts for their own work. Anyone who can read their own incidents can have this, with no notification rules or admin rights.

How it works

What happens, step by step

Every 10 minutes, ClickRuntime checks ServiceNow for incidents assigned to you that changed since its last check.
If any did, you get one email listing each incident, its state and the latest note or change, with who made it.
It remembers when it last checked, so you only hear about each change once.

Before it runs live

Connect ServiceNow

What you get

RunsEvery 10 minutes

Hear when your incidents changetoday, 9:00Succeeded

Email · 2 of your incidents updatedINC0041207 (In Progress): Tomcat CVE patching 2026-10-19 10:12 - Robin Hale: patched staging, prod tonight

Build your own

Need it to work differently?

This template is a starting point. Copy the prompt and change it, or describe a different automation from scratch, with your own conditions, more apps or an AI step. Your assistant writes it, tests it and runs it on ClickRuntime.

Your own rules
Conditions, thresholds, filters and exceptions, written the way you'd explain them to a colleague.
Any number of apps
One automation can read from one app and update several others. Over 248 apps are ready, and anything with an API works too.
AI where it helps
Summaries, classification, extraction and drafts use ClickRuntime's built-in AI, with no extra key.
On a schedule or on each event
Runs as often as every 5 minutes, or the moment an app sends an event, and keeps track of what it already handled.

Changes you can ask for

Act only on the items that match your own rules, and skip the rest
Add an AI step, for example to summarize, sort or draft a reply
Add another app, for example also send it to Slack
Combine it with other ServiceNow steps into one automation

Under the hood

The code that runs this automation

This is the Python script that runs each time the automation starts. Your AI assistant writes it for you when you send the prompt, and you allow each step in your assistant. To change how the automation works, describe the change to your assistant and it updates the script for you. For every function it can use, see the script reference.

record_updated_alert.pyexample

from datetime import datetime, timezone
from clickruntime import on_trigger, credentials, http, state, notify, report_fetched

INSTANCE = "northwind"

def snow(method, path, **kw):
    resp = http.request(method, f"https://{INSTANCE}.service-now.com/api/now/{path}",
                        auth=(credentials.secret("SERVICENOW_USER"), credentials.secret("SERVICENOW_PASSWORD")),
                        headers={"Accept": "application/json"}, **kw)
    resp.raise_for_status()
    return resp.json()["result"]

@on_trigger
def run(event):
    since = state.get("since") or datetime.now(timezone.utc).strftime("%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S")
    now = datetime.now(timezone.utc).strftime("%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S")
    rows = snow("GET", "table/incident", params={
        "sysparm_query": f"assigned_to=javascript:gs.getUserID()^sys_updated_on>{since}",
        "sysparm_display_value": "true", "sysparm_fields": "number,state,comments,short_description"})
    report_fetched(len(rows))
    if not rows:
        return {"summary": "Nothing new"}
    lines = [f"{i['number']} ({i['state']}): {i['short_description']}\n{(i['comments'] or 'No comments').splitlines()[:3]}"
             for i in rows]
    notify.email_me(f"{len(rows)} of your incidents updated", "\n\n".join(lines))
    state.set("since", now)
    return {"updated": len(rows)}

FAQ

Common questions

Which incidents does it watch?

Those where the assigned_to field is you, or a user you specify, and where sys_updated_on is later than the last check. It can also watch incidents you opened by filtering on caller or opened_by.

Does a comment or work note count as an update?

Any change to the record updates sys_updated_on, including comments and work notes, so they can trigger a summary. If this is too noisy, the automation can compare fields and report only state, priority or assignment changes.

Can the changes go to Slack instead of email?

Yes. The summary can be posted to Slack, to a direct message or a channel, instead of being emailed. Tell your AI assistant where you would like updates, and the change will be shown for you to approve.

What permissions does it need?

read. Nothing else in your accounts is used.

Does it need AI?

No. It runs without AI, so it doesn't use your plan's AI allowance.

How many runs does it use?

One run each time it checks. Checks that find nothing new and stop right away aren't counted.

Can I change how it works?

Yes. Describe the change to your AI assistant, for example a different schedule, channel or filter. It updates the automation, tests it and tells you what changed.

Every 5 minutes