FreshDesk for managing Digital queries : how to use it

Introduction

If a rebel has a technical query, problem or suggestion, they should send a message to the Mattermost channel Tech Reception.

If they don't use Mattermost, Freshdesk is an alternative. Freshdesk is also used by people outside of XR with queries, problems or suggestions. Some queries raised in Tech Reception, e.g. for GDPR are passed on to Freshdesk.

Freshdesk is a help desk customer support system supplied by Freshworks and described by them as “a cloud-based customer support software that is both feature-rich and easy to use. With multiple support channels available, including live chat, email, phone, and social media, you can help customers through their preferred communication method”.

XR has the free version with only basic functionality.

The product owner of all instances of Freshdesk is still to be agreed, likely to be a Digital IC.

There are other instances (separately installed copies of the software) of Freshdesk not covered here used by the Reactive team and the Pathways team. The Reactive team may pass on tickets if they believe they are best managed here.

Tickets created in Freshdesk can only be managed by Freshdesk agents, one of whom should own a ticket until it is closed. There are 4 agent access levels and this guide only covers the lowest.

1 agent should act as triage to read and assign each new ticket to an agent with appropriate skills but they may in turn reassign it if agreed. An agent may seek help from a non agent, i.e. someone else in XR if they have the skills to resolve it.

Source of tickets

Rebels use this instance of Freshdesk, owned by Digital, by sending an email to tech@rebellion.earth (where is this email address published?).
Krystal redirects this to xrsupport@freshdesk.com which creates a ticket on Digital's FreshDesk instance xruk.freshdesk.com with the email message.

Freshdesk cannot distinguish between email traffic and feeds to Freshdesk via the link email address support@xruk.freshdesk.com.

Anyone anywhere could send emails to tech@rebellion.earth. A quick Google search reveals the email address is on the BBC website and many other news websites. We don't seem to get many from those sources, if at all.

The email address of the originator of the query is passed through this process such that when an Agent replies to the FreshDesk ticket the reply is sent to the originator, not back to tech@rebellion.earth.
Our FreshDesk instance allows us to audit trail responses to these queries and provide feedback to both the original enquiring rebel and the various support functions within XR UK.

When an email is received, it triggers an automatic reply :

Dear "Requestor",
Thank you for your email. We have received your request and a ticket has been created (**explain what is a ticket?**). We are staffed by part time volunteers, so please be patient with us - we will get to your request as soon as possible.

There is growing collection of useful articles on our knowledge base - this is limited at the moment but we aim to grow it as quickly as possible. Have a look and see if it helps.

To view the status of the ticket or add comments, please visit https://xruk.freshdesk.com/helpdesk/tickets/123456789

Love and rage, XR Tech

The above Knowledge Base link takes people to more links telling them how to use AN, Freshdesk etc. There is little there which should be removed and a link created to Rebel Toolkit, as our single surce of knowledge.

Levels of access by agents

There are 4 agent roles, in increasing order of privileges :
Agent Can view, respond to and assign tickets, as well as modify ticket properties.
Supervisor Can view and respond to tickets, generate reports and can also enable automatic ticket assignment of the member groups under the Admin tab.
Admin Can access everything and edit configurations under the Admin tab, but cannot view or modify billing information. Can update the dropdowns in the Group and Type properties.
Account Admin *Has complete access to everything, including billing and account management.

How to use Views

The left menu column is to choose what you want to view :

Dashboard : see below.
(2nd icon does not function for basic agent access)
All tickets : for the triage and agents to manage tickets. This list has filters in the right column on several properties. Click a ticket to see an indidual Ticket details.
Ticket details show the email trail, its properties, the requester's contact details and a timeline (?)
Contacts and Companies : What contacts and what companies are shown? Should they be deleted for GDPR if not needed?
Reports & Analytics can't see this with my access
Admin (list of Agents, etc). Only for admin agents.
Knowledge Base (mouse over shows Solutions)

Triage process

At any time, there must be 1 agent nominated as the triage who decides to whom a new ticket is assigned.
They access FreshDesk daily.

Analyse content of a new ticket

Technical problem or query - TTA responds or passes to the relevant agent.
Send PN to a member of the DDAT team, who will find them up on the Hub and remove as necessary. Reply to requestor when UnSubscribe completed.
Requests for removal of user information : (is un-subscribe different from data erasure?) these tickets should be owned by an agent from the GDPR team and resolution must comply with GDPR. Other Digital teams help with the data erasure
Subscribe Request - "add me to the Hub" Send PN to a member of DDAT who will work out what sort of Hub Invite to send. Reply that Request is being worked on.
Action Network : email database and Data Team enquiries, in the mandate of the Action Network Data team.
General Tech Problem
If you know the answer, then reply directly.
If not, establish which team is most likely to resolve the issue and contact them. They may not be in Digital. This may need a separate email or Message on Mattermost.
Website query on content or design
Send it to the XR team owning website content - Media & Messaging.
Volunteers Website
Send the query to the Pathways team.
Foundation Programme
Send the query to the Pathways team.
XR email address requests or issues
Pass query on to Adrian P, by email at adrian.xrsl@protonmail.com
Spam : If it looks like spam, there is a drop down menu from More on the Ticket screen that allows you to mark that individual ticket as spam. When you do you get the option to mark everything from that address as Spam. Freshdesk does not appear to have any native spam filter. For any egregious "unblockable" spam, go to the linked email account and set up a filter there.
Other if issue not covered by above, Agent can ask for more info from Requestor and/or research within XR to find potential resolution. The TTA should, therefore, have a reasonable working knowledge of the XR organisation, both UK and Global, or know whom to ask.

How an agent works on tickets

This is the dashboard

View all tickets and then use a filter to find those you wish to work on

New Queries are flagged (none in above screenshot). You then select a Query to see original request and any replies.

A typical query thread:

Resolving Tickets

Use the Status property when viewing a ticket to track its progress :

Open : initial value
Pending : help or advice being sought by the agent. Set back to Open when response received.
Resolved : useful for problem resolution, but not needed.
Closed : whatever action was needed has been taken and the requester has said it is ok.
The requester may never respond, especially for a data erasure. Allow a reasonable time before closing. If there is a late response, the ticket can be re-opened.

Internal Messaging

This function allows you to pass the query on to another FreshDesk Agent. In addition, you can forward the email thread to non Agents using their own email. This is useful when responding to rebel's requests for support outside Digital e.g. Local Group Coordinators.

To the right of the email thread are properties to categorise the query, define the status of the query (i.e. Pending, etc) and which Agent is dealing with the query.

Properties of a ticket in the central column

Type : this is in the central column with a drop list of types of query. Not sure if or how it is used. If needed, it could be adapted to hold the list in Resolving tickets above.
Group : only ever set to "Tech & infrastructure. It could be used to show the team owning the ticket, if ever needed.
Reply - this is important to maintain Requestor confidence during the processing.
Notes - used within Ticket thread for TTA to pass requests on to other Agents and to receive responses. The Notes thread acts as an audit trail defining how the request is handled. If any TTAs go down a path likely to be repeated, or answer a question likely to be asked again, then they should contribute to more notes for other TTAs (destination for note / knowledge base yet to be determined) or they update info (FAQs?) on Rebel Toolkit if the information can be shared publicly.
Status - see Resolving Tickets above.

Requests for groups or teams to use Freshdesk

To start using FreshDesk for your XR Subgroup, you must have the following

An email address that you are currently using to take on feedback/requests/tasks A group of people (agents) who are willing to share out the tasks in the emails amongst them

You must send an email to support@xruk.freshdesk.com with the following information:

The subgroup your team is a part of
A list of agents emails you wish to initially onboard to that group and the workload
The email address you'll be forwarding from while using FreshDesk

END OF INSTRUCTIONS

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