Performing Actions On A Job - Overview

An action is simply an update to a job.

Throughout the "life" of a job, certain events may be performed by staff in order to resolve the issue. These events, or actions should be recorded against the job so that an action log is generated and available for review. HelpMaster provides this functionality via the "Action" screen. The action screen allows the staff member to record a wide range of details about the action that they have just performed whilst working on a job. After an action has been entered, a summary of the action is added to the Action Log.

It is generally considered to be best practice to add an action to a job for everything you do in connection with that job. When everything is captured and documented, report statistics become more meaningful, staff and clients are better informed, and the true workload of your staff and organization are recorded.

Icons used throughout HelpMaster

	Action
	Action template

Different types of actions

HelpMaster provides specific support for the following types of actions :

Acknowledge job (date stamps a job with a specific action summary type that identifies when a staff member has "seen" a job)
Re-assign (assigns the job to another staff member)
Change status (changes the job status of the job)
Close (closes the job i.e. changes the job status code to "Closed")
Add progress (add general notes to a job)
Re-open (re-opens a job if it has already been closed)

The action screen is used for each of the functions outlined above. Furthermore, it is possible to combine several of these actions during the "action". For example, it is possible to change the status of the job, reassign it, as well as providing progress notes for that job.

The Action screen is displayed below.

The General tab

The Action template drop-down box. Select a pre-made Action, or simply fill in the blank action screen
Every action must have an "Action summary code". This identifies what type of action this is. When a new job is logged, this code is automatically set to "Create and assign job"
Select a job status
Assign the job to either a person, or a skillgroup. See Assigning jobs for further information about this. Use the Q Check button to display the Q Check screen.
Type any additional "Action" notes for this action
Specify the time taken to perform this action. This information is duplicated on the Billing tab.
Create a reminder for this action/job.
Specify who should get email, and what type of email content they receive. Use Email Templates, or compose your own
Check this box to prevent clients viewing the action via the web interface. This also affects some email tags.
Check this box to trigger the "Action Required" tag that is displayed to clients via the web portal. See Job State

When initially logging a job, a checkbox in the top-right corner of the screen will appear. Check this checkbox to add a reference to this job to your saved searches

The Billing tab

The time it took to perform the action. This can be manually set, automatically counted via the timer, or pre-set by using an Action Template
Check this box to mark it as a billable event. Billable actions can later be used in an invoice. Once this checkbox is checked, the rest of the billing and financial details become enabled.
Select which billing template to use. The billing template will update the cost of the job based on the action time (1) and the values set in the Billing Template.
Select which cost code to associate the cost with. This field is used as an extra level of classification to your billing.
Check the "Manually enter time & cost" to manually adjust the time. This is useful if you wish to preserve the real time the action took (1), but need to adjust the time that the cost and billing will be based on.

Click the "Calculate cost" to update the cost based on the new time that you've entered.
Add additional costs and items to the billing information. The value for these will be added to the total Action cost.
Billing notes : Enter any additional information about the billing.

Attachments tab

All of the attachments tabs throughout HelpMaster look and work in the same way.

The attachments toolbar.
The list of attachments
A preview of the attachment

Properties tab

Who performed the action. This defaults to the logged-in HelpMaster user
When the action was performed
Information about how this action was made. This will be populated after the action is saved. This information is useful to determine template usage.
The job complete status. This will update the job % complete reference on the actual job also

Audit History tab

All of the audit tabs throughout HelpMaster look and work in the same way.

The summary of the change
The specifics of the change

Action Security

Adding an action to a job is subject to the HelpMaster security model. This means that some staff members may be granted permission to perform some actions, but restricted to perform others.

Email Integration

An advanced feature of HelpMaster is the ability to send email based on the context and content of each action. The "Email this action to..." section of the action screen displays a number of checkboxes and drop-down boxes that allow the user to select a number of pre-made email templates that can be emailed out to the relevant parties to the action. The user can use one of the templates, or compose an email that can be sent.

Previous assignee : Refers to the person who has just lost this job. Only applies when the action is a re-assign action.

New assignee : Refers to the person that the job has been assigned to. When the job is being assigned directly to a skillgroup and not to a specific person within a skillgroup, the email will be sent to the skillgroup supervisor as specified in the Staff Manager.

Primary client : The primary clients linked to the job

All clients : All clients linked to a job. See the Job > Links tab for a list of all clients linked to a job

Use the CC and BCC options to send the email to other clients that are linked to the job.

How Email Templates are populated and displayed in the Action screen

When you design Email Templates, they are generally targetted to a particular recipient type (client, staff, new assignee etc). Each Email Template has a configuration setting that determines which of the drop-down boxes they will appear in. See the Email Setting tab on the Email Template screen for details about this. By default, HelpMaster will populate each of the drop-down boxes for each recipient type with the email templates that are marked for this type AND only those that have been subscribed to by the logged-on user.

At the bottom of each email template list are further options to re-load the list of available templates.

email template population options

Other... : Enter an email adress in the text box. Supports multiple email addresses separated by a semi-colon. Also supports email group names. Use the address book to pick addresses, or groups.

Action Templates

To make the use of actions even easier, HelpMaster supports the use of action templates. Each helpdesk staff member can create and then subscribe to a number of action templates that can be used and re-used for frequent helpdesk tasks.