> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.aciona.me/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.
# Assign to someone else
> How to hand an incident to another owner, and what the rules are.
Besides taking an incident for yourself, you can assign it to someone else — for example when the problem clearly belongs to their area, or when the on-call person needs to hand it over.
## How to assign
Open the incident in the dashboard and pick the new owner. The change:
* Moves the incident to `assigned` with the new owner.
* Sends a notification to whoever received it.
* Records on the timeline who assigned it and to whom.
## Who can assign to whom
| Your role | Can assign to |
| ---------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Owner** | Any active member of the organization |
| **Admin** | Any active member of the organization |
| **Member** | Only someone on the **incident's team** — and you must be on that team too |
| **Viewer** | Cannot assign |
If the incident has **no team**, a member can only **take it for themselves**. Owners and admins remain unrestricted.
Assigning outside this rule returns an error saying the assignee must be a member of the incident's team. That is not a bug: the rule exists to stop an incident from being pushed onto someone with no context and no responsibility for that service.
## Assignment by escalation
Automatic escalation also assigns: when the timeout expires, the incident is reassigned to the next target. That reassignment shows up on the timeline as a system action, with no author.