*astTECS Ticket management system / helpdesk system

1. TICKET MANAGEMENT SYSTEM / HELPDESK SYSTEM
If you work with people, sell a product, or provide a service, you likely deal with complaints, and
those complaints can take many forms.
Organizations failing to properly handle complaints could potentially damage their reputation, loose
their customers and can get negative publicity.
With complaints coming in from all sources, you need a complaint management process that keeps
the person making the complaint in the loop. Basic complaint management normally includes a
timely acknowledgement, a process towards resolution, and a final outcome that benefits everyone.
Complaints offer businesses an opportunity to correct immediate problems. In addition, they
frequently provide constructive ideas for improving products, adapting marketing practices,
upgrading services, or modifying promotional material and product information.
To help your managing your business complaints efficiently and productively, *astCRM has
designed a lean tool that can be used to offer resolutions to your customers and to analyze multiple
flaws with your products and services.
NOTE: Being an open source tool, our complaint management system can be further customize to
adopt any of your organization requirements.

2. ITIL Framework to Offer IT Services
*astCRM Ticket management system is based on the ITIL concept of offering services!
ITIL, formally an acronym for Information Technology Infrastructure Library, is a set of
detailed practices for IT Service Management (ITSM) that focuses on aligning IT services with the
needs of business.
“The ultimate goal of ITIL is to improve how IT delivers and supports valued business services. “
ITIL is the most popular IT Service management framework, and has been successfully adapted by
many known organizations.
Figure below explained how an incedent occured in an IT service company is been handled.

3. FIGURE A :: ITIL Process Explained. REF : https://s-media-cache-
ak0.pinimg.com/originals/db/65/9b/db659b465da3aee903051a9ab41d34ec.png

4. Ticket Management Process
User / Customer Support Desk (L1) L2 Support Manager
InitiationExecutionMonitoring&
Control
ClosureExecution
Inform the
Issue
Web UI
Ticket Logging
Phone
Email
Ticket Categorization
Ticket Prioritization
Check for FAQ
Escalation
Required
NO
YES
Check for Previous
Similar Tickets
RESOLUTION
Manager Rating
+
Inputs
Customer Rating
+
Inputs
Ticket Closure
Root Cause
Analysis
Required
NOYES
Initiate
Generate Report Upload Report/Doc.
END
Analyse
Previous
Tickets
&
Create
FAQ
Website
Contact Form
Initial Diagnosis

5. *astCRM Ticket Management Solution is based on the Incident management of the most popular
ITIL service framework. The ultimate goal is to improve the capabilities of people, processes and
technology of the organization.
While customer being the core focus of any organization, any inputs, feedback and most
importantly complaints and requests from the customer should be treated professionally. *astCRM
Ticket Management Solution offers a complete package to manage your customer complaints and
requests. The ticket management stages are design to cover all major cycles of project management,
which are :
• Initiation
• Execution
• Monitoring and Control
• Closure
Here the main stages for *astCRM Ticket Management System.
1. Collecting Information
2. Ticket Logging
3. Ticket Categorization
4. Ticket Prioritization
5. Initial Diagnosis
6. Escalation
7. Analysing Similar Cases
8. Resolution
9. Customer Feedback & Confirmation
10.Closure
11.Root Cause Analysis
12.Documentation

6. 1. Collecting Information
The customer can make complaint using:
• Phone
• Email
• Website Contact Form
Phone calls received at Support Desk should be handled in an organized manner so that maximum
information can be collected from the customer about the Issue. The call attendee can use web UI of
'*astCRM Ticket Management System' for logging the details.
Support Email Ids can be created so that customer can write directly to the support team. *astCRM
Ticket Management System is designed to fetch all the email landing to the specific email ID and
create tickets for each email. The effort from the help desk is now reduced as they only need to link
the ticket with their existing customer profiles.
Every organization have their website, and most would like to collect the customer issues directly
from the website forms. Web forms can be created to collect the required information and tickets
can be created based on the details provided at these website forms.

7. 2. Ticket Logging
All the tickets must be fully logged and date/time stamped, regardless of their criticality.
If the support team is working on a ticket for an organization, it is possible that they can be asked to
deal with further issues. It is important that if its is done, a separate ticket is logged for each
additional issue or request handled – to ensure that a historical record is kept and credit is given for
the work undertaken.
Fields Available:
1. Title : Ticket Title shows the main issue about the customer complaints or requests.
2. Organization : Link the ticket to the client organization. If you create a ticket within an
organization, *astCRM Ticket Management System will automatically fetch the data. This field is
available with the links to create the organization and search the existing organization in the
database, if required.
3. Contact Name : If the organization has more than one contact person, manage everyone detail
with our solution. Ticket can also, be associated with the contact name so that they can be kept
informed during the ticket life cycle. Like organization, contact field also have links to create more
contacts or search existing contacts in the database, if required.

8. 3. Ticket Categorization
Ticket categorization should be done as a part on initial logging, so that exact type of issue is
recorded. This will be important later when looking at Issues / frequencies to estabilish trends, to
improve the product / service quality.
Also, it is important to identify service request from issues & complaints.
Multi level categorization can be made if the frequency of tickets is too high, so that the right team
can be notified at the earliest.
Example for multi level categorization:
Hardware
• Server
◦ Memory Board
▪ Card Failure
◦ SMPS
◦ Storage/HDD
▪ Crash
▪ Capacity
Fields Available:
1. Category – With options
• Hardware
• Software
• Administration
• Finance
• Logistic

9. 4. Ticket Prioritization
Another important aspect of logging every ticket is to agree and allocate an appropriate
prioritization code – as this will determine how the ticket is handled both by support tools and
support staff.
Prioritization can normally be determined by taking into account both the urgency of the issue
(how quickly business needs a resolution) & the level of impact it is causing. Factors that can
contribute to the impact level are :
• Risk of life of limb
• Number of services effected – may be multiple services
• Level of financial losses
• Effect on business reputation
Fields Available:
1. Priority – To determine the Urgency, with options
• Low
• Normal
• High
• Urgent
2. Severity – To determine the Impact on business, with options
• Minor
• Major
• Feature
• Critical

10. An effective way of calculating these elements and, offering priority level for each ticket is:
Severity
Minor Major Feature Critical
Priority Low 7 6 5 4
Normal 6 5 4 3
High 5 4 3 2
Urgent 4 3 2 1
Priority CODE Resolution Time (Target)
1 1 Hour
2 4 Hours
3 8 Hours
4 24 Hours
5 48 Hours.
6 Resource Availability
7 RnD

11. 5. Initial Diagnosis
The Service Desk analyst (L1) must carry out initial diagnosis, typically while the customer is still
on telephone, to try to discover full symptoms of the issue, and to determine exactly what has gone
wrong.
If possible, Service Desk analyst will resolve the issue, while the customer is still on telephone –
and close the ticket if resolution is successful.
The service desk analyst can also visit FAQ (frequently asked question) and answer the customer, if
the solution is available.
This initial diagnosis, helps by:
• Creating happy and satisfied customer, as they have instant solutions to their queries.
• Filtering new requests and change requests from the complaints and issues, for the
change management team, or sales team.
• Filter out unnecessary job requests, before it escalated to higher stage.
In the case of tickets where the user is just seeking information, the Service Desk should be able to
provide this fairly quickly and resolve the service request – but if a fault is being reported, this is an
issue and likely to require some degree of investigation and diagnosis.
Fields Available:
1. Status – To determine status of the Ticket, with options
• Open
• In progress
• Waiting for Response
• Closed
• On Hold
• Invalid
2. Ticket Type
With Option
• Complaints
• Request
• Internal
3. Description
4. Initial Diagnosis

12. 6. Escalation
As soon as it became clear that Service Desk (L1) is unable to resolve the ticket, it must be
immediately escalated for further support to L2.
The escalation can be done to an individual, or the team. If escalated is done to the team, its team-
leader's responsibility to further assign to the responsible individual.
If it is obvious that the ticket will need deeper technical knowledge – or when the second-level
group has not been able to resolve the issue within agreed target times (whichever comes first), the
ticket must be immediately escalated to the appropriate third-level support group.
Note: Ticket Ownership remains with the Service Desk! Regardless of where an ticket is referred to
during its life, ownership of the ticket remains with the Service Desk at all times. The Service Desk
remains responsible for tracking progress, keeping users informed and ultimately
for ticket Closure.
Fields Available:
1. Assign To

13. 7. Analysing Similar Cases
Now the ticket has been escalated to the L2 team. The team has to further assign it to a responsible
person to resolve the issue. The best tool to initiate the resolution is CRM itself. With the historical
data on issues with same product or similar issues can help the Support person to find a solution in
much less time.
If there is a previous case with similar issue recorded, then resolution steps can be followed to
provide the solution.
Fields Available:
1. Inputs from Similar Cases

14. 8. Resolution
When a potential resolution has been identified, this should be applied and sufficient testing must be
performed to ensure that recovery action is complete and that the service has been fully restored.
The Ticket must be updated accordingly with all relevant information and details so that a full
history is maintained.
The resolving group (L2) should pass the Ticket back to the Service Desk for closure action. This
can be done by changing the Ticket Status From Open / In-progress to 'Waiting for Response'
Fields Available:
1. Status :: Waiting for response
2. Resolution / Solution

15. 9. Customer Feedback & Confirmation
Customer feedback is important because it provides insight that can use to improve the business,
products, and / or overall customer experience.
Customer feedback offers a direct line of communication with your customer so you can determine
if they are not happy with the service you are delivering before you lose their business.
Before Customer feedback, we also recommend that internal review to be done with the experts and
managers. Project learning, key notes and other important points can be listed for future references.
Fields Available:
1. Manager Rating – with options,
• 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5
Note : With 1 being “Rejected” response for Solution provided, and 5 is “complete satisfaction”.
2. Manager Input
3. Customer Rating – with options,
• 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5
Note : With 1 being “Rejected” response for Solution provided, and 5 is “complete satisfaction”.
4. Customer Input

16. 10. Closure
The Service Desk should check that the issue is fully resolved and that the customer is satisfied and
willing to agree the ticket can be closed.
Also, it is required that service desk should insert time used to resolve this ticket.
Fields Available:
1. Days
2. Hours
11. Root Cause Analysis
Once the customer business is restored, and process is running again, the Team Lead / Manager can
decide if the the issue required root cause analysis.
A root cause is a factor that caused a non-conformance and should be permanently eliminated
through process improvement. So the same issue may not occur again. The Support Team (L2)
should analyse the complete issue and the problem areas. It is done so that a larger number of
customer can be prevented from getting the same issue, or to stop the same issue occurring with the
same customer.
Fields Available:
1. Root Cause Analysis
12. Documentation
A documented format for root cause analysis is to be shared with the Team Lead / Manager by the
L2 Team. The approved documents can be attached with the ticket so that it can be refereed in
future.
Fields Available:
1. Attachment

17. ADDITIONAL FEATURES
~ by *astCRM
• Prompt resolution of customer complaints
ADDITIONAL FEATURES
1. Email Integration
No need to check multiple outboxes of your support executive mail clients to find email
communication made with a customer. Send all emails using our “ticket management system” and
get easy access to all the send emails associated with customer profiles.
2. Easy Modifications
Change or edit any field, or create new field easily with the user friendly web interface. Capture the
data of your choice.
3. Schedules & Reminders
Any task or follow up for the tickets can be created within the software. Our ticket management
system offers regular reminder, to do list and calender scheduling.
4. SMS Integration
Give your client immediate responses, both during initiating the ticket and resolving the ticket,
along with a unique Ticket ID. This will make the customer feel that his concern are taken seriously
by you.
5. FAQ
Create FAQ, where your 'support desk' can readily respond to customer query. This will make the
process faster, and your customer would be more happy.