Call tracking?

[dhutch.livejournal.com]

Just wondering - what do some of you out there use to track support calls? I'm looking for recommendations.

Edit: Helps when you think before you post- can't help it - I'm sick beyond belief. Anyway - I need something that runs under Windows, to track in-house support calls. Follow up flags, reporting on machine/user/problem type.

Comments

[sketchydave.livejournal.com]

Well, first off, what do you want to do with the data? Do you need it to be tied to a customer's info, email ability, database export, tied to the phone system, log call times? There is a ton of stuff out there, if you want a good recommendation I would narrow down your goals.

[jecook]

For a while, I used a GPL product called IRM. It works quite well. We are eventually going to be using Remedy Helpdesk at some point. Our "interim" method consists of word documents, one per work order. ::rolls eyes::

(I was forced to shut down IRM because it was residing on a "public" server. Never mind that fact that I own the hardware, pay for the DSL line it's attached to, and operate the domain name it was on...)

[jecook]

Oh, I've also used a product called Request Tracker, which works ok as long as you hand build a server to run it on. It requires a custom build of Apache with IIRC MOD_PERL complied in, and not run as a module...

[arkady.livejournal.com]

We use Request Tracker (http://www.bestpractical.com/rt/); I can't really recommend or disrecommend it to be honest, as we don't pay a huge amount of attention to it. About once a week I go through the list of requests and close off the ones I know have been dealt with by other members of the team, but I don't think it's being used half as much as it ought to.

[sketchydave.livejournal.com]

Good god thats terrible. Couldn't you set up a box running it on your office LAN?

[dhutch.livejournal.com]

I'm looking to track in-house support calls, make sure they get followed up on. It will not tied to the phone system. Looking for records of what was done, when, resolution, who called it in. Ability to go back and report/track based on machine, or user.
The company I work for is looking at some serious expansion in the next 4-6 months, and I'm looking for solutions ahead of time to make sure nothing gets lost in the shuffle, once we do the aquisition.

[dhutch.livejournal.com]

Arg. I need to make sure when I post I'm not sick or doing 20 other things. One thing I didnt mention - I'm looking for something Microsoft based. Sad, I know, but I'm stuck with it.

[compwizrd.livejournal.com]

Portable black hole.

[snow-leopard.livejournal.com]

We use RT http://www.bestpractical.com/rt/ which I can recommend so long as you know Perl as its freeware and you can alter the code to get it behaving just as you need for your particular company.

[dhutch.livejournal.com]

Ha! I've got users that could break even that. *sigh*
Although, if you know where to get one - I could sure use it!!

[jecook]

Ah. IIRC< the remedy product will run off of MSSQL, or use an Access database backend...

[jecook]

Don't have a spare machine that'll do it acceptably. That's what RT was running on, and the performance coming from it was awful.

Plus boss wants everything to be windows based... ::rolls eyes::

[aylinn.livejournal.com]

I've survived Remedy & McAfee.

If you have a high call volume (i.e. one that will break access' 32000 limit fairly quickly) I can't recommend McAfee.

Remedy seems to be the standard that I've seen.

[alysania.livejournal.com]

I've used Remedy and Peregrine Service Center in the past. Remedy is ANNOYING AS HELL in comparison to Peregrine, however Remedy does have some bigger & better reporting functions.. peregrine is much easier on the inbound call center tech since there are fewer fields to fill in when you have to close or open a ticket. But fewer fields means fewer reporting options, depending on what you're looking for.

[alysania.livejournal.com]

Oh, and Magic Total Service desk. I remember that one being fairly decent and the last incarnation I used was umm, 2001? and web based, reliable, at a university with a not-so-high call volume (4 full timers and 2 or 3 students at any given shift, not 24/7)

[sketchydave.livejournal.com]

Well I see its gotta be Windows only, so your best bet will probably be Remedy. But my advice on Remedy is useless as I last used it...7 years ago. It seems to be the standard, and you know the saying "no one gets fired for buying IBM." Basically if you get the industry standard you will always be fine. Plus any new techs you hire might already know the system.

See my bosses just never wanted to pay for software that works, so I always got around it with free software that works. Woohoo for Open Source!

[kostika.livejournal.com]

We use a program called AmberCat (http://www.ambercat.com). Has email, manual, and web support for call logging. Does reports, handles called stats and such. Works under windows. And to boot it's cheap.

[sketchydave.livejournal.com]

Well you know how you can get around that. Just charge a huge fee and unplug the server now and then, that will make it look like Microsoft!

[said-by-me.livejournal.com]

We use Remedy and its pretty crappy....

[kelly-bean.livejournal.com]

we're really cheap and just have an extensive access database that we enter support calls into.

[geekgrrl-ca.livejournal.com]

We use a peoplesoft product called iCare. For the longest time it was called "iCrash" but lately it's worked pretty well.

[tsutton.livejournal.com]

We use Sunrise Enterprise (http://www.sunrisesw.com/main/products.php?content=enterprise) - very good product.

[agentz.livejournal.com]

We use assyst Enterprise from Axios Systems (http://www.axiossystems.com/six/en/home.php), running it off an MS SQL back-end database.

[akage.livejournal.com]

I've used Remedy-based setups, and Peregrine Service Center.

Remedy seems to be as good as its administrator. If you have an admin who knows what the hell they're doing, they can streamline the interface and give you only the fields you need. Problem is, a lot of companies buy it out of the box and hand off the admin duties to some poor schlep in IT who has no idea how to tweak it. So the techs have to deal with a shitload of unnecessary and/or inapplicable fields on their screen.

Peregrine is less tweakable, but as a result it's also a little easier to predict. Once you've seen one Peregrine system, you've pretty much seen 'em all. Remedy systems can look completely different from one desk to the next.

[kalium.livejournal.com]

Here at Umich we use Footprints.

Sort of. I look at it myself maybe once or twice a month.

[the-s-guy.livejournal.com]

For the past many years we used an in-house product called Quantum, which was modified from asset-tracking software. It had many, many aggravating quirks but mostly did what it was supposed to (and had the advantage that it would asset-track any broken hardware). Unfortunately, the programming team was external and consisted of three people and a dog, two of whom were unavailable at any given time, so the many outstanding problems could never be fixed.

We've been told we'll be switching to HP OpenView 4.5 in another year or so. We've also been told that apparently this product is unable to re-open its own logs for followups - and because our testing team was picked from managers and other sawdust-brained fools, it took them a year to discover this. I can't imagine what other basic functionality it will be missing by the time it's foisted off on us. God forbid that anyone who will actually have to use this thing have a chance to evaluate it.

Anyone else used it? Is is really as bad as it's shaping up to be?

[kerberos.livejournal.com]

We use OTRS - http://otrs.org/

Works really good. got diffrent queues for support,servergroup,netgroup,abuse and so on.
each email gets a ticket, while it's worked on it's owned by the tech. tickets will flagup if left unattended for 3 days.

response via email, one can put in phonetickets too.

great little system.