The document provides an overview and instructions for using a HelpDesk application. It describes the roles of administrator, logger, and technician. The administrator is responsible for setting up the system and generating reports. The logger logs client calls by categorizing issues and assigning technicians. Technicians are assigned to departments and attend to client calls. The document provides step-by-step instructions for common tasks like logging a new call, searching for an existing call, and setting up user accounts, categories, departments, and messages.

1. HelpDesk Training Manual
Part one:
Introduction
The HelpDesk Application has been designed as an online application to assist in
the logging of calls directed to a call centre. In Version 1.0 there are three main
Roles a user can assume:
1. Administrator
2. Logger
3. Technician
The Administrator Role
The administrator role functionality has two functions defined in this version
namely the set up of the HelpDesk System and the production of reports
pertaining to activities by Loggers and Technicians.
Setup
The Setup of the HelpDesk System is the most important aspect of the application
and it is crucial that the administrator understands and setups the HelpDesk
System correctly to maintain an efficient and useful application. In this manual
you will find details on how to Setup the various options correctly.
Reports
The Reporting functionality of this application lets administrators generate and
distribute reports according criteria selected. The purpose of reports is to
determine the efficiency of the HelpDesk System staff at attend callers calls.
Callers will now on be referred to as clients. The reports enable the administrator
to assess trends in the client’s calls and the response of the HelpDesk System
staff.
The Logger Role
The logger role primary functionality is to log client’s calls and assign the calls to
a suitable category, department and technician so that a quick and relevant
solution to the client’s problem can be delivered.
The Technician Role
The technician role primary function is to attend to clients calls as logged by the
loggers. Technicians belong to predefined departments which could represent
geographical locations or organisational structures. For each call any number of
technicians can be assigned, however it is recommended that only the minimum
number of technicians should be assigned to a call. Additionally a call must be
assigned a lead technician who has the authority to manage the calls final
outcome (in other words – the solution delivered to the client on the summation
of the call).

2. Part Two:
Using the HelpDesk System
Login
To login to the HelpDesk System locate the application using the URL given by
the webserver administrator. The default page of the application will appear and
you must enter your credentials as defined by the administrator email you have
received.
1. Type in your username in the username field.
2. Type in your password in the password field.
3. Click the ‘Login’ button to proceed or click the ‘Clear’ button to correct
your credentials.
4. If your login is successful you will be directed to the home page pertinent
to your role defined on the HelpDesk System as assigned by an
Administrator. Please read the sections in this manual concerning your role
for further information.
Note: Passwords are CaSe SeNsItIvE but usernames are not

3. The Administrator Role
NOTE:
Observe this order when first configuring a new installation.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Configure
Configure
Configure
Configure
Configure
Departments
Categories
Quick Solutions
Users
Messages
The Menu
The Administrator menu of Version 1.0 of HelpDesk System consists of the
following:
1. Home
2. Reports
a. Call Report
b. History Report
3. Admin
a. Manage Users
b. Manage Quick Solutions
c. Manage Departments
d. Manage Categories
e. Manage Messages
4. Logoff
The menu also includes your name to indicate that you are logged in as the
named user.
The menu is a drop down menu and to activate the menu just put your mouse
over it and clicks on a sub item.
The Home Page
The home page lets you see information relevant to the system activities and
your account (at the time of writing full functionality is not implemented yet).
In the ‘Your Details’ panel there is an indicator of number of logins (total times
you have logged in successfully), your account age (today’s date minus the date
your account was created represented in days), Number of Failed login attempts
and a link to change your account details.
In the ‘Common Tasks’ panel are details about your recent activities and links to
the most common tasks you perform on the system (some administrators might
perform more Quick Solution Tasks whereas another administrator might perform
more Reporting Tasks)
In the ‘HelpDesk Statistics’ Panel you can get a quick overview of how the
HelpDesk is fulfilling your business needs.

4. In the ‘Greeting Message’ Panel you can view a message that pertains to
administrators only. This message can be customised by the administrators on
the system and is useful to communicate important messages to your fellow
administrators.
The Administration Menu Pages
Manage Users
From the manage users page you can choose to add a new user or modify an
existing account.
Due to the nature of this program an account cannot be deleted in this version
(support will be added for this in future versions)
TIP: To prevent too many users occurring on the system I advise that you use
the inheritance feature of the users account system to allow a new user to
inherit the previous users details if you wish.
To add a new user account, navigate from the ‘Add New User’ option to add a
new user and follow this procedure:
1. Type in the relevant details for the user.
2. Make sure the email address is a valid email address and conforms to the
domain for your particular SMTP server as setup by the Webserver
Administrator.
3. Select what type of role the user will perform.

5. 4. If you have selected ‘Technician’ the Department dropdown list will be
enabled from which you must select a department.
TIP: Do not use the ‘All Departments’ selection unless you want that particular
user to be available for all departments.
5. Confirm the Option to activate user is selected.
6. Click ‘Save’ to add the user account to the HelpDesk System
Note: Most accounts can be changed to perform different roles on the system.
Most of the accounts can be Activated and De-Activated. The exception is the
‘admin’ account which cannot be De-Activated nor have the role changed. This
is the master account and is the only account on the system that is activated
by default on the initial setup of the system.
To edit an existing user accounts follow this procedure:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Click ‘Update Existing User’
Click ‘Edit’ for the user you wish to edit.
Change the details of the account.
Click ‘Save’ to save your changes.
To Activate or De-Activate an existing user follow this procedure:
1. If the Activated field shows ‘True’ click ‘True’ to de-activate the user.
2. If the Activated field shows ‘False’ click ‘False’ to re-activate the user.
NOTE: A user that has been de-activated will not be able to login to the
HelpDesk System
Exceptions that could be experienced during account creation or
modification.
1. The username already exists.
In this case please use a different user name in the username field.
2. Email Address Required.
Please type in a valid Email Address into the Email Field. Email addresses
conform
to
the
standard
recommended
here:
http://email.about.com/cs/standards/a/email_addresses.htm
3. The email address is not valid for the SMTP server of the [Application
Name] HelpDesk. The email address must end with [HelpDesk Domain].
Confirm with the Webserver administrator and SMTP administrator what
domain the emails must belong to, and configure email accounts ending
with the specified domain
4. Department Required.
It is mandatory that Technicians must be assigned to a department
configured in the HelpDesk System
NOTE: All fields are compulsory, except Department unless a Technician is
being configured

6. Manage Quick Solutions
Quick Solutions have been implemented in the HelpDesk System to assist loggers
to log calls quickly and allow solutions to be predefined for Technicians attending
calls.
Quick Solutions are divided into Categories in order for different types of Quick
Solutions to be applied to different problem sets. E.g. if a number of software
problems are regularly encountered by clients a category for software problems
should be configured and a number of quick solutions defined for the problem
type. A couple of examples for the Software category could be:
1. Problem: I receive an error when I try to browse the network.
Possible Solution: Check with the network administrator if you have access
permissions on the network resource you are attempting to access.
2. Problem: I receive a number of dialogs when I open Microsoft Office that
indicate that I need to install additional components and that I need to
locate the installation files, but if I continue to click cancel Microsoft Office
eventually loads and I can use it normally.
Possible Solution: Contact your IT support person to install the necessary
components as needed.
To Configure a Quick Solution it is advisable to have a meeting with loggers and
technicians on the HelpDesk System to find out what the clients most common
encountered problems are.
Once you have identified and compiled Quick Solution templates and have
configured the necessary categories you can enter the Quick Solution on the
Quick Solution page.

7. To configure a new Quick Solution follow this procedure:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Type in the name of the Quick Solution in the Quick Solution Name field.
Type in the description of the Quick Solution in the Description field.
Type in the solution of the Quick Solution in the Solution field.
Select a category to which this quick solution belongs.
Click ‘Add’
If a Quick Solution is not needed anymore you can de-activate the Quick Solution
to make it unavailable to loggers. In Version 1.0 of HelpDesk System the quick
solutions cannot be deleted.
To edit a Quick Solution click ‘Edit’ and edit the details as necessary. Click
‘Update’ to save your changes.
Manage Categories
As the system grows it is useful to have categories of different types of problems
experienced by the HelpDesk System clients for reporting purposes. I recommend
that the HelpDesk System has numerous categories defined to make enable the
best use of the reporting facility in order to compile the most accurate statistics
for the client’s problems.
Once a number of categories have been defined it is possible to configure Quick
Solutions for each category as described in the previous section.

8. To configure a new category follow this procedure:
1. Type in a category name in the Category Name Field.
2. Click ‘Add’
To edit an existing category follow this procedure:
1. Click ‘Edit’
2. Change the Category Name Field.
3. Click ‘Update’ to save your changes.
Manage Departments
The Departments on the HelpDesk System allow the administrator to assign
technicians for various departments. This assignment ensures that only the
appropriate technicians for a department are assigned to a particular call. A
Technician assigned to ‘All Departments’ can be assigned to any call but it is not
recommended.

9. To configure a new department follow this procedure:
1. Type in the department name in the Department Name field.
2. Type in the department code (maximum of 4 characters) into the
Department Code field.
3. Click ‘Add’
To edit an existing department follow this procedure:
1. Click ‘Edit’.
2. Update the Department Name and Department Code fields.
3. Click Update.
Manage Messages
The Messages of the HelpDesk System is a very important feature of the
application.

10. Messages are divided into the following types:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Message to Client
Message to Users
Message to Loggers
Message to Technicians
Message to Administrators
Message to Superuser
Message to All Active Users
System Message
Configuring Messages
The messages on the HelpDesk System can be configured to dynamically suit
your needs as the application grows. Each message has ‘Tags’ which act as place
holders in that particular message. The system works similar to Microsoft Office
mail merge and replaces the ‘Tags’ with the data relevant to the particular
message recipient.
Message ‘Tags’ should be inserted into the Message Text or Message Title fields
exactly as indicated by the messages Available Tags field. These tags should not
be altered as this will render them un-usable in the out going message.
Only the Available tags for a particular message can be used in the particular
message. They are not ‘cross-referenceable’ between messages.
Messages can be up to two thousand characters long and may not include HTML
tags in Version 1.0 of HelpDesk System.
Message to Client

11. The messages configured under this heading are sent to clients as there calls are
processed during the lifecycle of the call.
Message to Users
The messages configured under this heading are sent to users as for purposes of
account maintenance.
Message to Loggers
The messages configured under this heading are sent to loggers to inform them
of changes or additions to the applications logging calls functionality.
Message to Technicians
The messages configured under this heading are sent to technicians to inform
them of calls that have been assigned to them.
Message to Administrators
The messages configured under this heading are sent to administrators for the
purposes of administration.
Message to Superuser
This feature is not supported in Version 1.0 of HelpDesk System.
Message to All Active Users
This feature is not supported in Version 1.0 of the HelpDesk System
System Messages
The messages configured here allow you to insert pre-determined text into other
messages and set the greeting messages for the users configured for specific
roles.
Examples of these messages could include Seasonal Greetings, Warnings, Policy
Changes, Reminders or whatever comes to mind.
Our Recommendation is that you configure the disclaimer to be used in all email
messages immediately.
The Logger Menu Pages
Home Page
The home page lets you see information relevant to the system activities and
your account (at the time of writing full functionality is not implemented yet).
In the ‘Your Details’ panel there is an indicator of number of logins (total times
you have logged in successfully), your account age (today’s date minus the date

12. your account was created represented in days), Number of Failed login attempts
and a link to change your account details.
In the ‘Common Tasks’ panel are details about your recent activities and links to
the most common tasks you perform on the system.
In the ‘History’ Panel you can get a quick overview of the last 10 calls you have
logged.
In the ‘Greeting Message’ Panel you can view a message that pertains to loggers
only. This message can be customised by the administrators on the system and is
useful to communicate important messages loggers.
Log Call Page
The log call page enables loggers to log a client’s call and assign it to a single
technician or a number of technicians to attend to.
Once a call has been received the logger should follow this procedure to log the
call:
1. Check with the client whether they have used the HelpDesk System
before.
2. If they are a new caller the logger needs to click new client and follow the
procedure from step 6 in this procedure.

13. 3. If the client is an existing client the logger needs to click Existing client
and search for their records on the HelpDesk System
4. To search for an existing client you can use these details to search the
database:
a. client number
b. first name

14. c. last name
d. telephone number
e. email address
To increase the speed of the query it is advisable that you use the
clients email address as it is most likely to produce just a single result.
5. Once the logger has confirmed the client exists on the database and you
have the correct client (verify that their details match the details on the
database) select the client by clicking the ‘Select’ button and their details
will be loaded into the log call page and the logger can proceed to log the
call according to step 6 in this procedure.
6. To log the call the logger needs to listen to the client’s problem and use
discretion when selecting the category, department, technician(s) and lead
technician.
7. If the call falls into a category where there are Quick Solutions configured
for it the logger may apply a Quick Solution if appropriate to the client’s
needs, by selecting a Quick Solution matching the description of the
problem as indicated by the client.
8. During the conversation with the client the logger needs to determine the
correct department to select and continue to select the appropriate
technician(s) to solve the problem.
9. The logger needs to select the appropriate lead technician for the call in
order to submit the call.
10. The logger can if necessary add a note to the technicians if they see fit.
The note will be distributed to all technicians assigned to the particular call
and will not be emailed to the client, it is therefore an ideal place to
express warnings to the technicians as to the clients temperament or
particular details such as addresses, office numbers and so on.
11. If the particular clients details are incorrect (having already established
that the client is the correct client) the logger can update the client’s
details as needed. When the submit button is clicked the clients details will
be updated on the system.
12. Once all the data is entered correctly the logger can proceed to submit the
call to the HelpDesk System and it will be assigned to the technician(s)
selected.
13. The Call may be cancelled at any point during the logging process but it is
inadvisable as this activity is recorded on the HelpDesk System and links
the cancelled call to a particular logger. A cancelled call also adds records
to the database and too many cancelled calls could be detrimental to the
performance of the system.
14. The Call may be cleared by clicking the ‘Clear’ button to clear the form of
existing data.
15. Once a call has been logged successfully the call is indicated as
successfully logged by the HelpDesk System and the logger may continue
to log another call according to this procedure.
NOTE: The call number of the call is always unique and is dynamically
generated according to various criteria.

15. Search for Call Page
The View Call page enables the logger to view the call according to a client
request. For example if a client calls and requests to get information about the
call the logger needs to obtain the call number for the specified call and enter
the details for the call into the ‘Call Number’ box and click ‘Search’. If the call
exists a record of the call will be displayed and the logger can proceed to view
the call and then communicate information about the call to the client. If more
than one record is displayed the call number has been partially entered and
the logger should confirm with the client that the call number is correct and
re-enter the number until only one record is displayed.

16. The image below displays a sample of what the logger will see once the call has
been displayed.

17. From this the logger and see the collaboration of the technicians about the call
and can tell the status of the call.
The Technician Menu Pages
The Technician Menu Pages are designed to allow the technicians to attend to
calls on the HelpDesk System.
View Call Page
The view call page allows the technician to view calls according to various search
criteria.
To view a call that has been assigned to a specific technician, select some search
criteria and click search to display calls meeting those criteria.
Important Note: In this version of HelpDesk System the default search is to
display ALL calls if no criterion is entered. This is NOT recommended as it could
be slow and may cause the server to run out of memory.
Once the criterion has been selected, click search and select a call to be
displayed.
A technician can use the ‘Flag’ column to sort the calls into various types
according to their own priorities. There are six different colours that the calls can
be sorted into and this is useful to help you organise your priority calls or sort
them according to your own criteria.
Once the technician has selected a call the ‘Manage Call’ page is displayed
containing the details for the specified call. From here the technician can add
notes, suggest solutions, vote to close, vote to action, close the call, action the
call and redefine the problem and solution according to the collaboration of other
technicians assigned to the call.

18. Manage Call Page
Follow these procedures to manage a call:
To Add a Note
1. Type in your note in the ‘Technician Note’ box, the second box under the
‘Technician Notes’ section of the page.
2. Click ‘Add Note’ to add your note to the ‘Technician Notes’ box.
Note: All the technicians (assigned for the specified call) and loggers can
view the notes but the client cannot.
To a Suggest a Solution
1. Type in your suggested solution in the ‘Suggest Solution’ box, the second
box under the ‘Solution’ section of the page.
2. Click ‘Suggest Solution’ to add the solution to the ‘Solution’ box.
Note: All technicians (assigned for the specified call) , loggers and clients can
view the suggested solution.
If you are assigned as the ‘Lead Technician’ for the specified call you have
permissions to Action the Call and Close the call. If you are not the lead
technician for the specified call you can Vote to Action the Call and Vote to Close
the call. The Close functions can only take place after the Action functions have
been performed.

19. Upon Actioning or Closing the call the Lead Technician can redefine to Problem
and Solution according to their estimation of the correct Problem and Solution
respectively.
To Action a Call
1. Click ‘Action Call’.
2. Redefine the Problem and Solution as required.
3. Click ‘Action’.
To Close a Call
1. Click ‘Close Call’.
2. Redefine the Problem and Solution as required.
3. Click ‘Close’.