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How It Works |
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Personal Helpdesk
makes working on support requests very easy by seamlessly
integrating the process of submitting, assigning,
tracking and fulfilling support requests all inside
your much used Microsoft Outlook!
Personal Helpdesk consists of a
simple install,
with which you can configure and maintain the Helpdesk
folders, drop down lists, templates, FAQs and other
helpdesk settings. It is installed on your computer
as an extension to Microsoft Outlook and enables you to work on
support cases in Outlook with the configured Helpdesk folders.
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Step 1.
Configure helpdesk settings
and drop downs |
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After
successful installation of Personal
Helpdesk to your system, start
Microsoft Outlook.
You will
see that additional menus,
toolbars or ribbons are
added in the explorer and
inspector windows of
Microsoft Outlook.
If you
are on Outlook 2007 or 2003, you
will find the Personal Helpdesk menu
just after the Help menu. If you are
on Outlook 2010, you will find the
'Personal Helpdesk' tab under the
backstage view. Either ways, from
this menu, you can administer the
settings of Personal Helpdesk. You
can define drop-down lists such as callers, problems,
assets, as well as emails and SMS
templates, predefined replies,
messaging options, web access etc.
You can also set the
Personal Helpdesk to monitor any number
of mailboxes and email folders, for
automatic processing of incoming
emails to support cases. This
process cuts the overhead of
manually generating support cases
from emails, thus diverting valuable
human resources to resolving the
case. |
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Step 2. Caller submits
support request via email, webform or phone call |
| An end-user
experiencing technical challenges
can self-service the answer to their
problem by accessing the web-based
knowledge base (through the Personal
Helpdesk Customer Web Service site).
If a solution is not found, the
end-user requests for support by sending an email,
by making a phone call or simply, by
filling a web form. These support
requests are then logged and
converted to cases in Outlook.
Further details and drop-down lists
(such as the classification of
problems the request falls into) can
then be set, by a supervisor or
manager.
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Step 3. Technician work to resolve the case
You then
proceeds to fulfill and resolve the
case, either in Outlook. You may
enforce a Service Level Agreement (SLA),
set due date and other deliverables
on the particular case, for quality
check purposes. Further
correspondence to the caller might
follow (in the form of emails, SMS,
phone calls). All activities related
to the case are logged and you can
fill time spent and notes. Relevant
asset information and fixes related
to the case can be accessed and
tracked right from the case form
itself.
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Step 4. Caller follows-up via email |
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The caller then can escalate, withdraw,
reopen or simply track the history
of their support cases online with
Caller Web Access (CWA).
Alternatively, caller can reply back
to email from the helpdesk and the
response automatically triggers an
escalation on that particular
support case. If a response from the
caller on an existing case is
received, the concerned technicians
are notified automatically. If the
case has been resolved, Personal
Helpdesk automatically re-opens and
marks it as an ongoing case. |
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Step 5.
Close case after
providing a resolution |
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Certain pre-defined Outlook views can
be used to track the progress of cases. Once
every parameter of the caller's request has
been fulfilled, a case be is closed. The
closed case is then moved to the
Resolved Cases folder. At the same
time, the caller gets notified
automatically on the closure of the
case. |
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Step 6. Add
resolution to knowledge base |
| A closed case can be a good source of
future reference and you
can create a new knowledge base entry
based on the case. It is then
available in the list of articles
under the integrated knowledge base, categorized and sorted, ready for
you to draw from when
similar issues arise. Additionally,
you can publish these
articles on to the Customer Web
Service site for providing first
level support to potential support
requests from your end-users.
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Step 7.
Generates statistical and
trend reports |
| To identify problem areas and increase
helpdesk efficiency, you can run
the statistical tool from time to time,
collecting valuable intelligence and trends
and generating meaningful reports.
For day
to day knowledge of the helpdesk,
you can generate summary reports to
get appraisal on the current
happenings on the helpdesk and track
recent cases generated, worked,
closed or reopened. |
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Step 8.
Archive old cases to database or PST
Over time,
the Team Helpdesk folders (in
Exchange) will be accumulated with
support cases mostly resolved ones.
You can either archive
the old case items to a PST file or
can export the case data to an
external database such as Oracle,
SQL or Access. Archiving
periodically keeps the exchange
folder from getting too big and
unwieldy, which could cause
Exchange/Microsoft Outlook
performance to slow down. |
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New!
Take a video tour |
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Quickly learn how to install,
configure and work with Personal
Helpdesk and how to get the most out
of your Outlook! |
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