Alerts

The Alerts feature can trigger email notifications to warn users about an approaching deadline or to call attention to a missed deadline.

You can configure the Alerts feature to reflect different service levels (response times). For example:

Severity 1 issues require a response within 1 hour.
Severity 2 issues require a response within 4 hours.
Severity 3 issues require a response within 1 day.

Configure the Alerts feature to reflect the service levels

These steps will set the alerts such that emails are triggered when a service level deadline is missed for a ticket (e.g. status has not changed for a ticket within X hours of it being reported).

1. Login to the workgroup as Admin and click on the Admin icon
2. Click on the Workflows link
3. Select the desired workflow in the pulldown at the top. The page will be refreshed with the properties of the selected workflow.
4. Expand the desired form in the Forms section
5. Click on the Edit Based On link to the right of Alerts
6. Select Severity and click OK to save the change, then click OK to confirm
7. Click on the Set Default Alert Settings button
8. "<Default>" will be selected in the pulldown at the top. Set the properties for this item. These are the properties that will be applied when new option menu items are added to the Severity field. Details about the options available can be found in the Forms in a Workflow Help section.

   Click OK to save the changes. Click on the Set Default Alert Settings button again.

9. Select "1" in the pulldown at the top. Set "Set Alerts" to "Yes", Send Alert to "1 hour(s) after <Now>" and set the rest of the options as desired. Click OK to save, then click on the Set Default Alert Settings button.
10. Select "2" in the pulldown at the top. Set "Set Alerts" to "Yes", Send Alert to "4 hour(s) after <Now>" and set the rest of the options as desired. Click OK to save, then click on the Set Default Alert Settings button.
11. Select "3" in the pulldown at the top. Set "Set Alerts" to "Yes", Send Alert to "1 day(s) after <Now>" and set the rest of the options as desired. Click OK to save, then click on the Set Default Alert Settings button.

Reports

Add Last Updated Date Field to Saved Queries used by Support / Help Desk
A "Last Updated Date" field is automatically tracked for each ticket. You may want to add this field as a column on reports that Support / Help Desk Engineers use to process tickets. It would also be a useful addition to manager reports as well. To add this field to a report:

1. Click on the Query icon
2. In the Saved Queries pulldown, select the desired report. The Report Layouts pulldown will be updated with the report layout associated with the saved query you selected.
3. Edit the report layout by clicking on the Edit button to the right of the Report Layouts pulldown
4. Select "Last Updated Date" in one of the columns of the report and click OK to save the change

Use Charts to Monitor Performance
You can create a saved chart in the Metrics section that will show the average response time for a given service level for tickets that have already been processed. To do this:

1. Create a saved query to return tickets for a given service level (e.g. Severity 1 tickets).To do this:
   1. Click on the Query icon
   2. Click on the Add button to the right of the Saved Queries pulldown
   3. Enter a name for the saved query (e.g. "Severity 1 Tickets"). Choose whether it will be a personal or group report. If it is a group report, select a group. Select "Standard" for Query Format and click Next to proceed.
   4. Click on the Clear button
   5. Select the desired Project and Form, then click on the Get Fields button
   6. Set "Severity" to "1" and "Status" to "Closed", then click on the Add button to save the query. Click OK when it has been saved.
2. Click on the Metrics icon
3. Click on the Add button to the right of the Saved Charts pulldown
4. Enter a name for the new chart (e.g. Service Level Performance). Select whether the chart will be a personal or group chart. If it is a group chart, select a group, then click Next to proceed.
5. For "Chart Layout" select one of the Bar or Table layouts. Select the desired Project and Form. Select the saved query you created for "Default Input Records".

   In the "Calculate the..." section, select "average time from Date Reported to Close Date in <time increment>"

   In the "Perform calculations...", select "during each <time increment>" for either a relative or specific date range.

   In the "Breakdown calculations..." select a pulldown, if desired. Or, select "do not breakdown calculations".

   Click Add to save the chart