Jump to content

SLA Timers Never Accurate- Email "black hole"


Malcolm

Recommended Posts

I wasn't sure how to title this, but essentially I need to know if there is a way to properly capture the time between an email hitting the mailbox and that email being converted in to a ticket.

The issue we have is that the SLA timer cannot kick in until the ticket conversion occurs. Which means all KPI reporting we do as business is borderline useless when analyzing with customers.

We are contractually obligated to these SLAs, and with no accurate way of measuring them it is having a detrimental affect on customer relationships.

Can anything be done in this regard?

e.g. Emails straight in as tickets and categorised in terms of Service, Incident/Service Request after the fact

OR

Can the time that email is logged be captured and measured against

Link to comment
Share on other sites

16 minutes ago, Malcolm said:

Emails straight in as tickets

This can be easily achieved with Routing Rules.

17 minutes ago, Malcolm said:

and categorised in terms of Service, Incident/Service Request after the fact

No, this must be done when a Request is raised.

 

18 minutes ago, Malcolm said:

Can the time that email is logged be captured

This is available from a Get Request Information -> Source Email Details node for Requests that are raised from emails.
The information could be stored in a date/time Custom Field and reported against.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

15 minutes ago, Malcolm said:

Can the time that email is logged be captured and measured against

@Malcolm simply put, no. I do understand the requirement and where this comes from but current functionality does not allow this type of measurement. In addition to what Steve said above, all I can say there is to describe the reason for this, even if this does not help with what you are trying to achieve, at least it explains why. Request timers can only be started by the "Start Request Timer" nodes. There is no other functionality in Hornbill that will start a request timer. You can most likely imagine now that regardless of how fast the request is raised, workflow spawned, node executes... there will always be a difference (no matter how small, can be minutes, seconds, milliseconds)... not only between when the request is raised (date logged) but also from when the respective mail arrives in the mailbox (even if is automatically raised by routing rule, more if a request is manually raised). Moreover, there is also no functionality to "move" the start time for a request timer...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

22 minutes ago, Steve Giller said:

This is available from a Get Request Information -> Source Email Details node for Requests that are raised from emails.
The information could be stored in a date/time Custom Field and reported against.

That could be useful. Where can I find for more information on this please?

 

19 minutes ago, Victor said:

I do understand the requirement and where this comes from but current functionality does not allow this type of measurement

Is this something that might be addressed in the future?

Or the ability to change the reference number from an Incident to an SR after its been logged?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 minutes ago, Malcolm said:

Where can I find for more information on this please?

Details on Service Manager Business Process nodes are documented on the wiki.

 

8 minutes ago, Malcolm said:

Is this something that might be addressed in the future?

Or the ability to change the reference number from an Incident to an SR after its been logged?

As far as I'm aware neither of these are changes that are being considered.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Can they be considered?

The thing is if the timer cannot take in to account the delivery time of an email, and we cannot use routing rules for emails coming from users, then as far as our customers are concerned the SLAs are irrelevant. Its affecting business relationships so would be great if this is something that could be looked at.

Happy to discuss further with whoever can be available.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 minutes ago, Steve Giller said:

You can do this, however you will need to specify the Request Type at the point of logging.

thats the issue, there is nothing in an email from a user that will tell the system the Request Type.

And there is no way to change this after logging.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

I found this in the Roadmap, and it sounds like it might help with what I am trying to achieve:

 
Quote

 

Redesign the service portfolio offering in Service Management
This project involves introducing the concept of request types, removing hardcoded request types and including supported progressive capture flows & business processes when designing a service.
Started On: 2022-05-27

 

Is there any update on when this might be implemented?
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

@Malcolm

Quote

And there is no way to change this after logging

Because you typically run a business process against a request, changing the request type is a challenge, so typically you would just raise a service request, and then perhaps raise another child request of the appropriate request type after whatever triage process you follow.  

I can tell you, the redesign of the portfolio in Service Manager is proving to be a challenge, we are currently working out how best to effect the changes we want to make to take Hornbill forward as we have many ESM requirements we want to meet, but we are figuring out how we can get those changes without impacting customers, there is no easy answer to this it seems, and its not something we can do as quickly as I would have hoped.  None the less, we are looking at it, and I there are definitely things we have in mind that could help with what you are trying to achieve, but I would not suggest waiting for these changes as we have no clear delivery date for this change and the end result might not be what you want. 

Gerry

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...