If possible, all of your end users should be interactive users so they can log their own problems.
If you must field incoming telephone calls, consider training a receptionist or having a first level support person take the initial call, and open and dispatch the service request.
When fielding incoming telephone calls, always ask the caller for their reference number, and when handling a new call, insure that the requester is provided with a reference number.
Decide how requests will be dispatched. Optimally, at any given time of the day, one specific person should be designated to dispatch requests, avoiding a situation where two dispatchers both attempt to dispatch the same request.
Be sure to make provisions for when the designated dispatcher is not available for extended periods of time.
Decide how many queues, and which queues, need to be set up and given the skill sets of your Support Reps.
Set guidelines for establishing priority.
Specify acceptable turn-around times for various priority levels.
Decide how frequently, if at all, requests can be passed directly to Support Reps, thus bypassing the queuing system.
Decide on levels for MaxPick and Open quota for all of your Support Reps - if you do not wish to impose quotas, set them to be 999.
Require Support Reps to use the ”Accept” method if you wish to rigidly adhere to MaxPick quotas.
Make it a job requirement that Support Reps log all of their daily activity into HelpSTAR.
Create a special ”timesheet” service request for Support Reps to use when performing duties that fall outside the realm of conventional service requests. The timesheet service request can be used to keep track of time spent performing daily maintenance activities, etc. and can be closed by the rep at the end of each day, week, or month as suits your organization.
Decide if you want to gather approval ratings for all requests or just a subset of requests.
Decide if you want your end users to give approval ratings for their own requests, and instruct them how to do so if necessary.
Nominate a librarian to perform a daily or weekly review of the service requests flowing through your help desk. The librarian should build Best Solutions for the appropriate problems.
Encourage your end users to use the Best Solutions feature prior to contacting the help desk.
Encourage your Support Reps to search Best Solutions first and then historical requests, before ”bothering” another rep for the solution to a problem.
Periodically review the activity flowing through your help desk, looking for areas of weakness.
A concentration of requests with one category may indicate a need for end user training (e.g. Microsoft Excel training).
A build-up of service requests, or long waiting times in queues, indicates a lack of expertise in those areas among your Support Reps. This can justify a request to upper management for more staff, or justify training classes for some of your reps.
Low user satisfaction ratings in specific areas can point out the need for more staff and/or training.
Examine your Support Reps’ timesheets, to ensure that they are indeed logging all activity and to make sure that they are completing tasks in an appropriate length of time.
Depending on the nature of your organization, you may want to use incentives to encourage your Support Reps to:
be diligent about logging all requests
provide top quality service
complete the ”most” service requests in a given time period
See Also:
HelpSTAR 2012 Installation Procedures