Mailbox

About Mailbox

Give every staff member a full web-based email client built right into Perfex CRM’s admin area. Mailbox connects each user’s own IMAP account to the CRM, so they can send, receive, draft, organize and label email without ever leaving their dashboard - and turn any message into CRM work in a single click. Instead of bouncing between a separate webmail tab and your customer records, the conversation and the context finally live in the same place. It is email, fully integrated into the project-management tool your team already relies on every day.

A modern Gmail-style inbox, not a stripped-down widget

Mailbox feels like the email clients your team already knows. A clean, compact Gmail-style interface gives you email threading with collapsible conversations, a split-view preview pane for quick scanning, archive and snooze to keep things tidy, starring and important flags, and advanced search that finds any email instantly using multiple filters. Tune the layout to the way you work with three density views - Cozy, Comfortable and Compact - and a column visibility toggle that hides what you do not need. Bulk actions, a three-dots action menu and a read-emails counter round out day-to-day handling, and a localized interface keeps global teams comfortable in their own language.

By default the module performs a one-way sync that fetches your unread inbox mail into Perfex, where actions like Star, Trash and Important are stored locally in the database along with their attachments. If you want your mailbox kept perfectly aligned, per-staff read status sync writes the read state back to your email server - open an email in Perfex and it is automatically marked as read on Gmail or Outlook too, with auto-mark-as-read controls for both the preview pane and the single-message view.

Connect any account - securely

Every staff member configures their own connection, so company email is centralized while inboxes stay separate and private. Each user sets their own IMAP server, port and encryption, maps their Sent, Drafts, Trash, Spam and Archive folders, and chooses per-staff preferences such as importing unread only and toggling HTML rendering. The module signs in to the IMAP server using the staff member’s own profile email address, which each person can change from their profile at any time.

Security is enterprise-grade. For Gmail and Outlook, OAuth2 authentication means secure, password-free connections with no credentials to store, and tokens are encrypted and refreshed automatically before they expire. Where passwords are still used, they are encrypted with AES-256-CBC before they ever reach the database. Sending is covered too: OAuth2 email sending works for Gmail and Outlook, with Outlook handled through a single Exchange Online resource and SMTP XOAUTH2. Under the hood, Mailbox runs on a modern, actively maintained IMAP library (Webklex/php-imap v4.x), with database performance indexes, batch processing for the initial sync of large inboxes and a manual email-sync endpoint when you want to pull mail on demand.

Compose, automate and schedule

A rich WYSIWYG compose experience makes writing email comfortable, with file attachments, inline images, dynamic merge fields and keyboard shortcuts. Reusable email templates and signature management keep replies fast, polished and on-brand. Need a message to land at the perfect moment? Schedule it with Send Later so it goes out when engagement is highest, whether you are syncing with global teams or planning drip campaigns.

Let routine handling take care of itself. A powerful email rules system filters and organizes incoming mail based on custom conditions and actions, and auto-replies keep conversations going while staff are away - automatically sending personalized messages when leads, tickets or clients reach specific stages in your workflow, so follow-up stays consistent every time.

Organize with tags, labels and folders

Apply multiple color-coded tags and labels to any email and triage hundreds of conversations at a glance. Create, edit and filter by tags like Important, Support or VIP Lead to segment your mailbox and prioritize responses. Keep things tidy with nested folders, smart live filtering and quick-move actions, then reach any tagged conversation in a single search - perfect for teams managing high volumes of email daily.

Where email meets your CRM

This is what a webmail client built for Perfex can do that a standalone one never will: act on an email directly against your CRM records. From any message you can:

• Assign it to a customer and keep the full thread on that customer’s profile as an internal conversation, right next to their invoices, projects and tickets.
• Convert it to a task - assign it to your team, set deadlines and track progress, all linked back to the original conversation.
• Convert it into a support ticket - tag, prioritize and route the inquiry to the right department so nothing slips through the cracks.
• Link it to a lead - tie inbound messages to your sales pipeline, and a dedicated Conversation tab on the lead collects every assigned email into one context-rich history.

Contact management is built in as well. Maintain a unified, CRM-integrated address book and add, edit or merge contacts directly from the mailbox interface, complete with profiles and communication logs, plus address autocomplete that speeds up every new message.

Built for teams, installed in seconds

Because each staff member runs their own account, Mailbox centralizes company communication while keeping every inbox private. Per-user templates and signatures keep everyone consistent, the localized interface suits international teams, and the whole experience lives inside the CRM your staff already use all day. It takes only a few seconds to install and activate before you have a fully working Mailbox client.

Requirements

Mailbox is a module for Perfex CRM and requires PHP 7.4 or newer. You need an IMAP-enabled email account - POP accounts are not supported - that can accept SSL/TLS connections from a third-party app, namely your Perfex installation. If your account uses two-factor authentication, connect Gmail or Outlook through OAuth2 for a secure, password-free login; otherwise plain IMAP credentials are accepted. Perfex’s cron job must also be configured correctly so mail is fetched in the background. Sent mail is stored in the module’s Sent folder and uses Perfex’s own outgoing email settings.