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Problems IT Help Desk customers frequently encounter

Whether your organization has an in-house or outsourced IT Help Desk, some of your IT Help Desk customers are likely dissatisfied with the service they are receiving. Some of the common causes of dissatisfaction with IT Help Desks include:

1. Rude Help Desk Service Reps.

2. Long wait times when calling the Help Desk or after submitting a service request by e-mail or using a Help Desk Web portal or ticket system

3. CSR's that don't understand their customers' problems

4. Closing IT incident tickets before problems are resolved

5. Lack of follow-up by IT Help Desk CSR's

6. IT customers confronted with recurring problems for which the cause never gets addressed or eliminated

7. Inadequately trained IT Help Desk Service Reps that lack knowledge needed to solve problems

8. IT customers having to explain their problem or question to multiple CSR's and IT technicians

9. IT customers having to wait a long time for Help Desk problem resolution, hardware repairs, software installation, and other IT support provided at their desk or by phone/e-mail

10. IT Help Desks not being staffed when customers need support (nights, weekends)

11. IT Help Desks having CSRs with difficulty communicating with IT customers in English (e.g. IT Help Desks often outsourced in other countries)

Assessing IT Customer Satisfaction and IT Performance

The best way to assess IT Help Desk customer satisfaction and IT Help Desk performance is to conduct an 'IT customer satisfaction survey'.

An IT customer survey gathers IT customer / IT user perceptions, experiences and suggestions about IT Help Desk performance, along with the performance of other IT services. The collective information and insight provided by IT customers provides IT Help Desk and other IT managers with the ammunition they need to make changes to increase service levels and customer satisfaction.

In a well designed IT survey, IT customers indicate their satisfaction level with the in-house or outsourced IT Help Desk and with the other IT support services including Desk Side Support, Application Support, Network Support and any other IT services. IT customers also include comments and suggestions related to the specific issues included in the survey questions.

The IT survey should include questions about IT CSR knowledge, problem handling and resolution effectiveness, CSR courtesy and professionalism, timeliness in actually contacting the Help Desk, timeliness in getting problems resolved, ability of Help Desk CSRs to understand the customer's problem, follow-up by CSRs and other pertinent questions.

To achieve the best results, IT survey responses should be anonymous. IT customers are more likely to respond to IT surveys and to provide honest feedback when they know their responses are anonymous, eliminating any chance of retribution from IT staff if negative ratings and comments are given.

Most organizations that conduct 'IT Help Desk surveys' conduct the surveys annually or semi-annually, using the same questions in every survey. Some organizations do a great job of taking action based on the survey results, while other organizations take minimal action. When we conduct IT Help Desk surveys for our customer companies and other types of organizations, we provide them with trend reports that track progress in addressing problem areas and opportunities needing improvement. Help Desk managers receive survey data that identifies areas of strength and weakness, where improvements have been made since previous surveys, and where Help Desk customer satisfaction levels have decreased.

Most IT Help Desk customers respond to surveys with the expectation that their feedback will be taken into consideration and acted upon. When IT Help Desk managers take action on survey results and Help Desk performance and service levels are visibly improved, IT customers are more likely to respond to future surveys.

Important IT Help Desk survey design and survey execution issues:

1. Asking the right questions and wording them effectively.

2. Making IT survey responses anonymous. IT Help Desk customers are more likely to respond to IT surveys and to provide honest answers when an outside survey company conducts the survey and they are comfortable that their responses will be anonymous.

3. Including IT customer demographic questions (location, department and other pertinent demographic information), and generating survey reports for each demographic criterion.

4. Providing the opportunity to include comments and suggestions along with ratings.

5. Encouraging participation in the survey.

6. Sharing the survey results with IT Help Desk customers and IT Help Desk employees.

7. Acting on the survey results.

8. Conducting the survey annually, semi-annually or quarterly and tracking IT Help Desk customer satisfaction and IT Help Desk performance progress.

Acting to increase IT Help Desk Customer satisfaction and IT Help Desk performance

Some of the actions that CTOs, CIOs, IT Help Desk managers and other IT managers can take to increase Help Desk service levels and customer satisfaction include:

1. Providing training and mentoring for IT Help Desk CSRs in how to handle customer calls, problem handling and resolution, acting professionally, technology knowledge, IT customer follow-up and other pertinent issues.

2. Identifying and managing IT Help Desk customer expectations for service.

3. Establishing and communicating SLAs (service level agreements or standards) to Help Desk CSRs and IT Help Desk customers.

4. Ensuring that Help Desk CSR hiring practices are effective in hiring the right people to staff the IT Help Desk.

5. Staffing and scheduling the IT Help Desk to provide consistently high levels of customer service based on IT customer demand for service.

6. Identifying and eliminating recurring technology problems.

7. Streamlining the IT environment.

8. Providing effective IT Desk Side and Application support.

9. Having an effective IT Help Desk ticket tracking system, managing ticket ageing to keep the backlog minimal, and ensuring that tickets are not closed prematurely, before problems are resolved completely and effectively.

10. Sharing IT survey results with IT Help Desk staff and other IT employees, enabling them to understand how IT customers perceive the effectiveness of IT Help Desk and other IT functions.

11. Creating an action plan to address the issues and opportunities identified by the IT survey and tracking implementation of actions/changes made to increase IT customer satisfaction and service levels.

Reasons to conduct IT Help Desk Surveys

Conducting IT Help Desk surveys and other IT customer satisfaction surveys / IT user satisfaction surveys is well worth the effort. When designed and executed well, with effective analysis of the survey data and timely action taken on opportunities, IT survey benefits include:

1. Significant increases in IT Help Desk service levels and customer satisfaction

3. Improvements in performance of the IT Help Desk and other IT functions

4. Decreased cost of delivering IT Help Desk and other IT services as they become more efficient and recurring problems are reduced or eliminated

5. Increased service levels for your company's external customers as employees are able to perform their job more effectively as a result of improved IT Help Desk performance

6. Reduced pressure on CIO's, CTO's, IT Help Desk and other IT managers as IT customer satisfaction increases