freshdesk

Basic Use

Note that when a client requests help by sending an email to either fds@columbia.edu or asit@columbia.edu, those emails now arrive into Freshdesk and are automatically turned into an ‘unassigned’ ticket.  Phone messages need to be manually turned into tickets (Click the “+ New” button upper-right corner of web Freshdesk interface).

The customer does receive an automatic notification that ASIT received their help request. When you close a case, they also receive a simple “satisfaction survey“.  Also, when you reply to a client using the Freshdesk interface, they will also receive a url to the ticket and they can add additional information by clicking on ‘login with Google’ and using their own uni logins.

Below are instructions on how to use the Freshdesk web interface to enter and close tickets.

Login

• Web: support.asit.columbia.edu (click on “login”) and “login with Google” with your uni@columbia.edu and uni password.
• Phone App: same (You should be able to do all the below in the phone app as well)

Assign tickets to yourself:

• On your assigned day, to see your tickets, click on Tickets in the upper menu, and on left side click Created on and Today. This will show you all tickets that have come in on your day.
  • NB: Tickets arriving from 12am to 12pm are yours (previously we  used to do 5pm to 5pm).
  • As before, check for any “unassigned” tickets from previous day that may have been missed, and notify that person (or Mike or Jai) that a ticket from previous day has been missed.
  • As before, if a “ticket” is actually obviously a spam email, please delete it or “mark it as spam” within freshdesk (see the menu options after you click on the ticket). This helps keep the inbox clear of spam.
• Assign your tickets to yourself either by selecting and replying to a ticket (will be auto assigned to you upon your replying if it was previously unassigned), or use the checkboxes and click on ‘pickup’ or ‘assign to’ along top menu and select yourself.
• If you are entering a ticket manually (for example, from a case received on phone), click the “+New” button (upper right corner) and fill out the fields. “Requestor” field should be the customer’s uni@columbia.edu.  “Agent” is you. Those two pieces of info and the Subject/Description field is the minimum you need to open a ticket.
• You can also forward a help request you received from a client in your personal email or lionmail. Just forward it to asit@columbia.edu or fds@columbia.edu. If you forward their original email (rather than your reply to them), Freshdesk the will automatically assign them as requestor and assign you as agent when it turns that email into a ticket. (If you try to forward your reply to them, you will wind up as ‘requestor’ in the system).

Reply to a ticket:

• In Freshdesk in general all communication with client is best done via Freshdesk web or app interface, not in your personal email. Simply click on a ticket and click on “Reply.”  You can also “Add Note” instead which is a private note in the ticket which the client will not see.
• You can reply to a freshdesk notification from your personal email as well, so long as freshdesk is cc’ed, your reply should become part of the ticket thread.

Adding time spent:

• When looking at a ticket, on the right side click “Time Tracked” and then “Add Time“. (You can also click in the upper menu, “more” and “add time“).
• Add the time in the format it asks for, make sure “Billable” is left checked, and click on “Start Timer” (non-intuitive button naming here) to add the time to the total. You can also edit the time field if you make a mistake.

Closing a ticket:

• Simply mark it as closed (or add last details and click “add and close”). The following pieces of information are required to close a ticket:
  • Client’s (“requestor’s”) email address (this should be auto filled)
  • Subject line and description fields of work done
  • Time spent
  • Client’s department (select from drop down list; you can also just start typing the department name and it will auto-filter the list)
  • Group (which should be FDS by default, else select it).
• The other fields (such as “type” or “source” or “priority”) are not as important and you don’t need to fill those out.

Additional FAQ:

Email commands:

• You can use these email commands when replying to notifications from Freshdesk.  In practice these may not be too useful. For instance, even though you can technically close a ticket via email, in reality there are “required fields” before closing a ticket that may prevent you from closing it if all the fields are not filled out correctly.