Alexa submission error

Question

I am trying to publish a courier tracking skill. This requires the session to be open even after the answer to the asked question is given.

For e.g.

Alexa: "How may I help you"

User: "What is the status of my shipment number 123"

Alexa: ".......(Status)....."

(session should remain open here)

User: "Can you tell me it's total cost"

Alexa: "The total cost is 12 dollars"

User: "Thank you"

(Now session should be ended)

But during skill submission I have been given a remark :

After the skill completes a task, the session remains open with no prompt to the user. The skill must close the session after fulfilling requests if it does not prompt the user for any input.

Is doing so compulsory to publish the skill?

Answer 1

In your case, the session is open after fulfilling the request and the skill does not ask for any input from the user. The session just stays ON. So, its a good practice to end the session there or you can include something like "Is there anything that I can help you with" or "Do you want to track any other order".

Answer 2

You're keeping the session open and not actually asking anything to the user, which is not a great Voice Experience.

Also, why not let your skill say "Thank you", as:

1. A user won't say thank you
2. Or even if he says, you have to keep the session open, again, to get that response and respond via your skill accordingly, which is little mundane

It should be something like:

Alexa: "How may I help you"

User: "What is the status of my shipment number 123"

Alexa: ".......(Status).....Do you want to know the Total cost?"

(session should remain open here)

User: "Yes"

Alexa: "The total cost is 12 dollars. Thank You."

// In case user says no

User: "No"

Alexa: "Thank You."