Alicia Key’s eternal question “How Come You Don’t Call Me” is a common refrain for many help desk professionals. Think back to your high school days. Do you remember the drama? “Why hasn’t she called?” “I hope he texts back!” “What did I do wrong?”
IT help desk teams regularly re-live this scenario. “I called my client, but she isn’t calling back.” “I really, really want to finish this support request, but he won’t answer my emails.” A quick phone call or email to your IT Specialist is sometimes all that’s needed to complete your service request.
A strong IT support relationship relies on two-way communication throughout the service period. To begin, the IT Specialist is required to receive verbal permission to remotely log into a computer to initiate a service request. To close a ticket, the same service member often needs the client to verify that the repair solved the issue before closing the ticket. With no return phone call or email from the client, the IT specialist places the ticket in “Waiting on Client” status until the client responds.
How can you keep the conversation moving during your service request? Here are some of our IT team’s tips.
Share Your Schedule
Provide 2-3 times when you are available by phone to approve a remote log in or verify a service repair. Sometime clients call with “I’m free right now” and all the service technicians are assigned to other tickets. Scheduling a specific time helps to ensure you and your assigned IT Specialist can connect and that no one wastes time with a rousing game of phone tag.
Leave a message
Life happens and that’s okay. If you can’t make your appointment, call or email your IT Specialist (or the client services coordinator) to reschedule. Going silent may work for submarines, but it doesn’t help get your computer fixed.
Schedule Outside of Regular Office Hours
If you just cannot take time out of your day, please tell us. We can attempt to schedule your service repair during a lunch hour, during a time you’re in a meeting, or if necessary, after hours.
Hey, it’s working again!
You’ve submitted a support ticket but suddenly the issue resolves on its own. Send us an email to enable the team to close the ticket.
Going on vacation? That’s great!
We do appreciate it when you let us know about an issue your having with your computer. Let’s schedule your service request for when you are back at your desk. We can’t log in without your permission and we don’t want to interrupt your vacation.
Assign a Proxy
We can also schedule a time with one of your team members, if you like, to address the repair. Schedule that time with us and approve your alternate contact before you leave on vacation.
If we don’t hear from you within four working days, we will close the ticket. But don’t fret! If the issue persists and you just got too busy to give us a call back, just respond to the ticket (REPLY) via email and the ticket will be automatically reopened!