Setting up a Help Desk

Create the Help Desk

A Help Desk is a project of the type Help Desk: open a space, Projects, New project, then a Help Desk template or Blank project and the type Help Desk. Its settings gain a Help Desk group of pages: Ticket types, Security and Access, Customers, Channels, Customer notifications, SLA and Saved replies.

The portal

Customers use the help centre at /help: they pick a ticket type, follow their tickets and manage their account there. One portal serves every Help Desk of the installation. Its name, heading, logo, banner, colours, light or dark theme, layout and footer links are set under Administration, Help Desk.

Ticket types

Project settings, Ticket types. Each ticket type (request form) is a card in the portal and a work item type in the project: what the portal calls it, one line under it, a group on the front page and a colour. Summary and description are always asked; add fields that are asked (optionally mandatory) or set automatically, such as priority, labels, due date or assignee.

Who may ask

• Customers: invite by e-mail. The person chooses their own password; the link in the letter works once and expires in seven days, and it is shown to you (once) only if the letter could not be sent. A Help Desk can also let customers sign up themselves (Security and Access, Sign-up), and directory and single sign-on rules can create Help Desk customer accounts
• Organisations: group customers by company or site. Under Security and Access decide whether customers see their organisation's tickets and whether members may reply to each other's
• Open to everyone: a Help Desk can accept tickets from anyone, with an account or with only an e-mail address (the first request creates a customer account), once public Help Desks are allowed under Administration, Security, Sharing and limits

Mail and notifications

Channels holds the desk's mailbox (see Outgoing e-mail and Help Desk mailboxes). Customer notifications choose which letters customers get: ticket created, new reply, status changed, ticket resolved, and whether the satisfaction question is asked once a ticket is resolved. Nothing is sent while the desk's e-mail channel under Channels is switched off. Internal notes never go out.

SLA policies

Project settings, SLA. A ticket is held to the first policy whose conditions all match (ticket type, work item type, priority or a custom field), so order matters; a policy without conditions catches the rest.

• Targets: First response, Resolution or a custom target, in minutes
• Timer rules: when it starts (on submission or on reaching a status), stops (a customer-visible reply or a status) and pauses (waiting for the customer or chosen statuses)
• When time runs: round the clock, the system's working hours (Administration, Calendar and dates) or one of the desk's own calendars
• Show this SLA to the customer: the promise counts down on their ticket in the portal

Calendars on the SLA page hold a time zone, the hours of each weekday and days off, optionally inheriting the system's holidays.

Reporting

The Help Desk's reports tab and the SLA dashboard widgets show what was kept and what ran late. Automation rules can react to SLA thresholds.