Create Ticket Based Events to Maintain a SLA

SmarterTrack's event-driven architecture makes defining a Service Level Agreement (SLA) and refining workflows easy and efficient.

Using the events system, managers can configure events at the system and user levels and set up automated actions based on those events to ensure employees are meeting SLA metrics and staying on top of their workflow.

For example, the events system can be used to:

• Ensure customer satisfaction with quality control related events based upon time and/or content.
• Bring secondary groups or individual agents on line when load or wait times exceed company standards.
• Automatically escalate tickets when the number of responses or idle time reaches certain parameters.

Similarly, agents can use the events system to ensure they are responding to tickets in a timely manner by configuring an event action that notifies them when they receive a new ticket or when a customer responds to a ticket.

Let's look at an example event that helps a team maintain their SLA for ensuring a ticket gets a reply within four hours. To do this, we'll create a system-level event on "ticket idle" time that notifies a manager if a ticket's idle time is greater than 4 hours for a front line support group.

Creating Ticket Based Events to Maintain a SLA

1. Log in to the SmarterTrack management interface as a System Administrator.
2. Click on Settings.
3. Under the Configuration header click on Events.
4. Ensure the Global tab is selected.
5. To create a new event, click the New button in the content pane toolbar. This will open the New Event modal.
6. In the Name field, type a name for the event. For our purposes, we'll use "Idle Time SLA" for the event's name.
7. In the Category field, select Tickets from the list.
8. For the event Type, select Ticket Idle, then click the OK button. This allows you to move on and set the conditions and actions for the event.
9. Ensure the Conditions tab is selected. Here, you can set the various conditions that need to be met in order for the event's actions to fire.
10. For the purposes of our example, we'll keep things simple: We'll check the boxes next to Idle Minutes and set it to "Greater Than" >  "240", then we'll check the box next to Group and set that to "Equals" > "Support Incoming", because that is the name of our Support front line group.
11. Next, we'll set the Actions that are performed when BOTH of those conditions are met.
12. Select the Actions tab, then click the Add Action button. The Action modal opens.
13. We'll keep things simple and just have an email sent to the Support Manager if a ticket's Idle time is over 4 hours (240 minutes). So..
14. Set the Action to Send Email (once per item), set the max frequency, enter the To and From addresses, set the title for the email (e.g., Ticket IDLE Time Warning) and then set the email body. A good rule of thumb is to provide the link to the ticket in question so that the manager can quickly find the ticket in question. You can do this by using the #AdminHyperlink# variable.
15. Once your Conditions and Actions are set, be sure to Save the event.

Once saved, you'll have a new event that fires off if a ticket in the Support Incoming group sits idle for more than 4 hours (240 minutes). The manager receives an email with a link to the ticket so they can take a look, talk to the agent and make sure the ticket is replied to without any further delay.

Of course, there are a number of different conditions that can be set for events, so virtually any SLA-specific metric can be managed. In addition, since agents can create their own events, they can help assist with maintaining any SLA you put in place, plus system events can be created so that managers and/or administrators can further keep track of the SLA metrics the business has in place.