Up for Grabs: What Happens When a Rep Has Not Called a Lead in 10 Minutes

Why does a due call sit untouched in the first place?

Almost never because a rep decided to ignore it. A rep is on another call with a customer who is about to say yes. They are driving between viewings. They are at lunch, at prayer, in a meeting with the manager, or on leave and forgot to say so. The lead arrived at a bad moment for that one person, and nobody else knew it was waiting.

This is normal working life, not a discipline problem. UAE labour law gives private-sector workers breaks during a long working day, and those breaks are not counted as working hours (see the UAE Government's guide to working hours). Reps also take annual, sick and other leave set out in the official leave guide. Any follow-up process that assumes the assigned rep is always free will leave leads waiting, every single day.

Waiting is what hurts. The 2011 Harvard Business Review study "The Short Life of Online Sales Leads" found that the chance of reaching and qualifying a web lead falls away quickly once the first hour has passed. A lead that waits for one busy rep to come free is losing value the whole time.

What happens when a call is untouched for 10 minutes?

Every try for a lead is a call on the assigned rep's Calls list, and the rep is alerted on their phone. If that call is left untouched for 10 minutes, it shows as up for grabs. Any available rep on the team can see it and pick it up. The first one to take it has it, and the lead does not wait for the original rep to come back.

Two details matter here. First, "untouched" means nobody has picked the call up. A rep who rang, got no answer and tapped No answer has finished that try, and the next try simply falls due on schedule. Second, up for grabs is a team view, not a penalty. The lead's timeline records that the call was put up for grabs, so a manager can still see who it was meant for and who took it.

What happens if it is still untouched at 20 minutes?

If the call is still untouched at 20 minutes, the owner is alerted. The order is deliberate: the team gets the first chance to catch it, and the owner only hears about the calls the team did not catch. An owner who is alerted about every new lead stops reading the alerts within a week. An owner who is alerted only when a lead has gone 20 minutes with nobody acting on it knows the alert means something.

When that alert arrives, the useful response is not to call the rep and ask why. It is to look at the call and ask one question: is anyone free right now? If yes, hand it to them or take it yourself. The question of why it sat can wait for the end of the week, when the pattern is clearer than any single lead.

What does marking a rep away do?

The 10- and 20-minute rules catch calls nobody planned for. Marking a rep away handles the absences you do know about. If a rep is marked away, their due calls move to the next available rep within about a minute. A rep heading into a long meeting, a site visit or a day off marks themselves away, and their new calls stop landing on a phone nobody is looking at.

This is the cheapest habit a team can build. It turns a 10-minute wait into a one-minute move, and it keeps the up-for-grabs view for the surprises rather than for every lunch break.

How do the three rules fit together?

None of these rules make a call. MAJ Leads does not ring leads itself and does not sell AI voice agents. The rules only make sure a call that is due reaches a person who is free to make it. Routing, opening hours and the five-try schedule are explained on how it works, and the full picture for UAE teams is on the lead management system for Dubai businesses page.

What should a sales manager review each week?

The alerts are for today. The pattern is for the weekly review. The Team page shows team performance, so a manager can see who is working the Calls list without asking around. Three questions are worth asking each week:

1. Whose calls end up as up for grabs most often? Usually the answer is a rep who is overloaded, not one who is lazy. Look at how leads are shared out under Who gets each lead in Settings before talking to the person.
2. When in the day do owner alerts arrive? If they cluster around lunch or the late afternoon, the team is thin at those hours. A rota or a habit of marking away fixes that faster than a warning.
3. Are reps marking themselves away? A team that never uses away is relying on the 10-minute rule to cover every absence, which means every absence costs a lead 10 minutes.

For a view of how quickly each rep makes the first call, read the rep leaderboard on time to first attempt.

Plans are on the pricing page. MAJ Leads costs AED 249 (Starter), AED 549 (Growth) or AED 999 (Pro) a month, with a 14-day free trial. A card is needed to start, and nothing is charged for 14 days.