Tickets Configuration Guide

This article details the different configuration options that available to Service Providers when using the IDI platform Tickets module and guides an administrator through the steps needed to set them up.

Configurable Objects

Types

Ticket Type provides a top-level classification for Tickets so that they can be grouped together based upon the business purpose that they are serving. Type is designed to capture the nature of the ticket as opposed to the specific issue/request that needs to be addressed.

Specifying a Ticket Type is required when creating a Ticket and the following Ticket Types are provided by default:

• Incident

• Question

• Work Request

• OnlineBill

Specifying different ticket types is useful when organizations have different process flows or responsible groups depending on the nature of the ticket. The type of the Ticket should be an indicator of what the response from the organization the user can expect.

The Tickets module allows administrators to specify for each Type what Categories are available, Escalation paths, end-subscriber visibility, as well as default values for properties such as Assigned To, Title, Description, Impact Urgency and Priority.

Categories

Ticket Categories provide classification for the request in order to aid initial support and ensure that the Ticket is properly routed through the organization. Categories also provide a quick way for users to understand the nature of the issue/request without needing to read the details of the description or journals.

Ticket Categories are optional when creating a Ticket and no Categories are provided by default.

Classification schemes and their strategies for establishing types and categories will vary from organization to organization. However, they share some common goals:

• They should direct further analysis, evaluation and routing, not attempt to diagnose root cause.

• They should be as simple and easy to use as possible.

• They should view things from a user perspective, not from a service provider or technology viewpoint.

The IDI platform allows up to three levels of Category classifications to be assigned to a Ticket. Typical classification schemes start with the type of service or product that the Ticket is in reference to, then identify the general nature of the issue/request and finally classify the specific issue or request.

For example, Categories for a Ticket Type of Incident may look like:

Dedicated Circuit -> Connectivity Issue -> Unable to connect

Dedicated Circuit -> Connectivity Issue -> Degraded performance

Dedicated Circuit -> Connectivity Issue -> Intermittent disconnects

The Tickets module allows administrators to specify what combinations of categories and subcategories are available for each Ticket type. Each category combination allows the admin to define Escalation paths, end-subscriber visibility, as well as default values for properties such as Assigned To, Title, Description, Impact Urgency and Priority.

Priority

Priority is used to identify the relative importance of a Ticket and is often used as the main guidance to an organization of how quickly a Ticket should be resolved.

Specifying a Priority is required when creating a Ticket and the following Priorities are provided by default:

• 1- High

• 2- Medium

• 3- Low

Each Priority must be mapped to a color indicator. The color indicator is used by the IDI platform when displaying the Priority in order to give users a quick visual cue as to the importance of the Ticket.

Available color indicators are:

• Red

• Orange

• Yellow

• Green

• Blue

• Purple

• Black

• White

Priorities also allow administrators to set a default Commit Date by specifying that the date will be x Hours from when the Ticket is opened.

Impact and Urgency

Impact and Urgency are metrics used to assist users in determining the priority of a Ticket. Users can input the Impact and Urgency of an issue/request based upon the information provided by the customer and have the system automatically assigns a priority based upon your organizations business rules.

Impact of the Ticket is a measure of the effect it has on the customer. Commonly Impact is represented by a measure of how many users, services or systems are affected. Typically Tickets affecting a single user would have a lower impact than one affecting an entire company.

Urgency of the Ticket is a measure of the extent to which the Ticket’s resolution can bear delay. Urgency is often influenced by the service that is affected, the nature of the issue/request and commitments to customers on resolution times for certain types of issues. For example, a Ticket opened because an end-subscriber web portal is unavailable would have a higher urgency than a Ticket reporting an error with a single report within the portal.

Users have the option of either directly specifying the Priority of Ticket when creating it or having Priority be calculated by the Impact and Urgency. The following Impact and Urgencies are provided by default:

• 1- High

• 2- Medium

• 3- Low

In order to have Priority be calculated administrators must specify which combinations of Impact and Urgency map to what Priorities. A typical Priority matrix may look something like this;

The IDI platform allows a separate Priority matrix to be configured for each Ticket Type.

Status and State

Ticket Status and State are indicators of how far down your organizations resolution process the Ticket has progressed.

Statuses are configured by an administrator and should match what users understand to be the distinct steps in the resolution process. Updating the status on a Ticket is often the indication that a Ticket has transitioned from one step to another.

Specifying a status is required when creating a Ticket and the following Statuses are provided by default:

• Open

• In progress

• Resolved

• Closed

States are representations of the underlying phases that all Tickets pass through. Every Ticket Status must be mapped to one of the pre-defined States which then allows the system to recognize what part of Ticket life-cycle your user-defined Statuses fit into.

The IDI platform provides the following Ticket States:

Open: Used to identify when a Ticket has been created but has not be assigned to or reviewed by the person providing initial support. Open indicates that no time has been invested into resolution yet.

In progress: Used to identify when work to resolve a Ticket has been initiated.

Resolved: Used to identify when the issue or request identified in the Ticket has been addressed but the Ticket is still active. Tickets may be assigned a Resolved status before they are Closed pending monitoring or verification that the issue/request has been fully addressed.

Closed: Indicates that no further work on a Ticket will be done.

Administrators can configure as many Statuses for each State as their organization requires. The default Statuses provided map very simply to States of the same name:

Journal Types

Journals entries allow users to record additional information, notes, communications and another other information that is relevant to a Ticket.

Journal Types allow organizations to provide classifications of the Journals that are being added. Classification makes it easier to filter and search for particular types of Journal entries and also gives users an at-a-glance indication of the nature of a Journal without needing to read the details.

An example of a typical Journal Type classification scheme may look like this:

Administrators indicate for each Journal Type whether or not the Journals of that classification will be viewable externally (e.g. viewable to the customer via the OnlineBill subscriber portal).

Journal Types set to external viewing defaults the Journal to customer viewable however the user has the option to override this on an individual Journal basis. Journal Types set to internal viewing do not allow users to set the viewable status and the Journal will automatically be set to internal only.

Type is required when adding a Journal and the following Journal Types are provided by default:

• Internal Note (Internal Viewing Only)

• Public Note (External Viewing by default)

Hold Reasons

Hold Reasons allow to specify why a Ticket is being placed on-hold. When a Ticket is on-hold the in progress time stops calculating.

Hold Reasons are required when placing a Ticket on-hold. The following default on-hold reasons are provided:

• Customer action required

• Third-party action required

Resolution Types

Resolution Types allow organizations to categorize the solution that was used to resolve a Ticket. Categorizing resolutions can be useful in reporting, analysis and standardization of Tickets.

Resolution Types are not required when resolving a Ticket and no codes are provided by default.

Attributes

Attributes allows organizations to record and specify additional user-defined information for Tickets and Journals. A different set of Attributes can be specified for each individual Ticket Type or Journal Type and the IDI platform will display these to the user when the configured types are selected.

Attributes set a required will not allow the user to create the Ticket or Journal without providing the necessary information.

Attributes are optional and none are provided by default.

Customer Alerts

Customer Alerts provide an account specific pop-up that must be acknowledge when viewing a Ticket associated to that customer. Customer Alerts can be used to convey information about the account that you want to ensure each user is aware of when servicing the customer.

Planning Your Configuration

Tickets Universal Configuration

This section guides administrators through the process of applying their custom Tickets configuration to the system. These configuration options apply to all Tickets and only needed to be added once.

Step #1 Creating Custom Hold Reasons

AdminConsole -> Data Management -> Journals -> Trouble Hold Reasons

Description: Name of the hold reason that displays in On-hold reason lists and on a Ticket after it has been placed on-hold

Step #2 Creating Resolution Types

AdminConsole -> Data Management -> Journals -> Trouble Ticket Resolutions

Description: Name of the Resolution Type that displays in list when resolving a Ticket and on a Ticket after it has been resolved.

Start Date: Starting date that the type will be visible to users. Unselected = visible immediately

End Date: Ending date that the type will be visible to users.

Step #3 Creating Custom Journal Types

AdminConsole -> Data Management -> Journals -> Journal Types

Journal Type: Name for the new Journal Type that will be displayed to users

Journal Group: Set to Customer Management

Journal Class: Set to Journal

Severity: <not used>

Escalation Group: <not used>

Escalation Hours: <not used>

Base Attribute (Optional): Set an attribute definition that will be added to the journal when this type is selected.

Auto-Assign Group: <not used>

Start Date: Starting date that the new type will be visible to users. Unselected = visible immediately

End Date: Ending date that the new type will be visible to users.

Use in OnlineBill: Check to indicate that journals of this type are to be viewable to end-subscribers in OnlineBill (or any other end-subscriber facing application.)

• When checked, journals created with this type will default to publicly viewable but this can be over-ridden by the user on a journal by journal basis.

• When unchecked, journals created with this type will default to Internal only and users will not be able to over-ride this.

Step #4 Creating Custom Ticket Impacts

AdminConsole -> Data Management -> Journals -> Tickets ->Ticket Impact

Name: Impact description that is displayed to users in Impact lists when creating or editing and displayed on a ticket when viewing Priority.

If you are planning to utilize automatically setting Priority based upon Impact and Urgency then Impacts should be added before utilizing the Ticket Priority Configuration screen.

Step #5 Creating Custom Ticket Urgencies

AdminConsole -> Data Management -> Journals -> Tickets ->Ticket Urgency

Name: Urgency description that is displayed to users in Urgency lists when creating or editing and displayed on a ticket when viewing Priority.

If you are planning to utilize automatically setting Priority based upon Impact and Urgency then Urgencies should be added before utilizing the Ticket Priority Configuration screen.

Step #6 Creating Custom Ticket Priorities

AdminConsole -> Data Management -> Journals -> Trouble Severity

Flag Type: Color indicator to be displayed with the Priority

Description: Priority name displayed to users. Priorities display in numeric/alphabetical order in CostGuard and it is recommended to use either numeric only or numeric – alpha if the desire is to display Priorities to users in order of importance.

Commit Date Default (optional): Set a default Commit Date to be assigned to the Ticket based upon the Priority. Commit Date is set based upon the configured number of hours from the time the Ticket was opened.

If you are planning to utilize automatically setting Priority based upon Impact and Urgency then Priorities should be added before utilizing the Ticket Priority Configuration screen.

Step #7 Creating Custom Statuses

AdminConsole -> Data Management -> Journals -> Journal Statuses

Journal Status: Name of the status that will appear in status lists and on Tickets

Journal Class: Set to Trouble Ticket

Ticket State: Select the Ticket state that the status maps to.

Step #8 Creating Categories

AdminConsole -> Data Management -> Journals -> Trouble Categories

A Ticket Category need to be added to the Trouble Categories screen once before it can be used to specify available Category combinations for each Ticket Type.

Please Note***:

To determine what Categories need to be added to this screen you should review all of your planned combinations of Category and Subcategories. Each unique value only needs to be created once even if it is repeated in different Ticket Type or Category/Subcategory combinations.

Description: The category name that will be displayed in Category lists when creating or adding Tickets and when viewing the Ticket.

Categories should be added before utilizing the Ticket Category Configuration screen.

Step #9 Configuring Customer Alerts

Tickets->Manage->Settings->Basic->General

Click the Edit Icon and check the box to allow active Customer Alerts to display when viewing a customer Ticket.

Tickets Type Configuration

This section guides administrators through the process of applying their custom Tickets configuration to the system. These configuration options apply to each Ticket Type that you are making available in the system

Step #10 Creating Custom Ticket Types

AdminConsole -> Data Management -> Journals -> Journal Types

Journal Type: Name for the new Ticket Type that will be displayed to users

Journal Group: Set to Customer Management

Journal Class: Set to Trouble Ticket

Escalation Group (Optional):

Escalation Hours (Optional):

Base Attribute (Optional): Set an attribute definition that will be added to the ticket when this type is selected.

Auto-Assign Group: Display only. Managed in Ticket Category Configuration

Start Date: Starting date that the new type will be visible to users. Unselected = visible immediately

End Date: Ending date that the new type will be visible to users.

Use in OnlineBill: Check to allow Tickets of this type to be viewable to end-subscribers in OnlineBill (or any other end-subscriber facing application).

• When checked, Tickets created with this type will default to publicly viewable but this can be over-ridden by the user on a ticket by ticket basis

• When unchecked, Tickets created with this type will default to Internal only and users will not be able to over-ride this.

Step #11 Creating Priority Impact/Urgency Matrixes

AdminConsole -> Data Management -> Journals -> Tickets ->Ticket Priority Configuration

Ticket Type: Select from the list of configured Ticket Types. Each Ticket Type maintains separate configuration for Impact/Urgency to Priority mappings.

Ticket Impact: Select from the list of configured Ticket Impacts.

Ticket Urgency: Select from the list of configured Ticket Urgencies.

Ticket Priority: Select from the list of configured Priorities what Priority the system will automatically set when the configured Impact and Urgency values are selected by the user.

Step # 12 Configuring Type / Category Combinations

AdminConsole -> Data Management -> Journals -> Tickets ->Ticket Category Configuration

Add a Ticket Type

Right click in the left hand side of the screen and select ‘New Root Type’

Ticket Type: Select the Type that you want to configure

Default Ticket Impact/Urgency: Set the Impact/Urgency that will automatically be set when a user creates a Ticket and specifies this Ticket Type

Default Ticket Priority: If not utilizing Impact and Urgency this will set the Priority that will automatically be set.

Auto Assign User Group: Select a group that the Ticket will default being assigned to.

Default Ticket Title: Define the Title of the Ticket to use.

Default Ticket Description Define the Ticket Description to use.

**Please Note:

• Default values are only used when creating Tickets, not during editing existing.

• Each Type/Category classification has to have default values explicitly defined in order for them to be used. Default values do not inherit down to lower-level classifications from high-level ones. The configured default values (or blank values) will be used only from the lowest level of classification that the user selects.

Example:

A configured default Title for a classification of Incident will not be used if the user selects a classification of Incident->Network Outage. This holds true even if there are no default values configured for Incident->Network Outage.

Add Categories to a Ticket Type

In the right hand side of the screen right-click on a Ticket Type. Select New Child Category to configure a single category or to add multiple entries at the same child level select ‘Add Bulk Categories’

Ticket Type: Predetermined based on the Type you are adding Categories to.

Category: Select from the list of configured Categories one you wish to make available for users when creating a Ticket of the specified Type.

Default Ticket Impact/Urgency: Set the Impact/Urgency that will automatically be set when a user creates a Ticket and specifies this Category

Default Ticket Priority: If not utilizing Impact and Urgency this will set the Priority that will automatically be set.

Auto Assign User Group: Select a group that the Ticket will default being assigned to.

Default Ticket Title: Define the Title of the Ticket to use.

Default Ticket Description Define the Ticket Description to use.

Add Subcategories to a Ticket Type/Category combination

In the right hand side of the screen right-click on a row that has a Type/Category combination configured.. Select New Child Category to configure a single subcategory or to add multiple entries at the same child level select ‘Add Bulk Categories’

Ticket Type: Predetermined based on the Type/Category you are adding Subcategories to.

Category: Predetermined based on the Type/Category you are adding Subcategories to.

Subcategory 1/ Subcategory 2: Select from the list of configured Categories the Subcategory you wish to make available for users when creating a Ticket with the specified Ticket/Category combination. If you are adding a Subcategory 2 then Subcategory 1 will already be predetermined based on your previous selection.

Default Ticket Impact/Urgency: Set the Impact/Urgency that will automatically be set when a user creates a Ticket and specifies this Category

Default Ticket Priority: If not utilizing Impact and Urgency this will set the Priority that will automatically be set.

Auto Assign User Group: Select a group that the Ticket will default being assigned to.

Default Ticket Title: Define the Title of the Ticket to use.

Default Ticket Description Define the Ticket Description to use.