The Essential Role of a Service Desk in Modern Business Operations

As a customer, you are right to expect the service or product you pay for to work the first time every time, but the reality is that sometimes things can go wrong. System monitoring and preventive maintenance can mitigate the risks, but we must still prepare for the unexpected.

Software updates, changes in the underlying infrastructure, or simple system misuse can all lead to an unexpected result. We all know how frustrating this can be when trying to complete a task, so having a contact point who empathises and wants to help resolve the problem is invaluable.

The Service Desk is the entry point to access a team of skilled resources dedicated to customer enablement. This may include user education, information gathering, or problem-solving. 

The team members themselves should have a variety of skill sets capable of answering queries and delivering solutions, ranging from infrastructure, data, or developer-based knowledge.

What is Service Desk?

The Service Desk is the primary communication channel between the service provider and the client. They provide information and updates to ensure that both sides are informed about, working towards, and achieving their commitments.  The Service Desk is an advocate for the user base and plays a role as the voice of the customer to ensure the product team has good information on how things are going and what is needed.

How Does it Work?

The client is given access to a ticketing portal where they can raise their query or bug; this can be carried out by logging into the ticket system and completing a brief form, or by writing to an email address provided by the Service Desk.

Once raised, an automatic response is delivered to the user by email which informs them that their query has been logged, a ticket ID allocated, and that they can expect a personal response in line with the response times that have been agreed with the customer.

When a ticket is raised, it is assigned to a Service Desk operator based on its urgency and who has raised the ticket. Some staff will be more familiar with particular systems or clients, although all operators will have fundamental knowledge of all products, services, and clients to swiftly respond or allocate it to the appropriate resource.

If there is insufficient information within the ticket to address the query, the client will be advised via the ticket thread, so that the operator can solicit all the relevant information to fully understand the client's needs.

Having acquired this, the operator should then be able to answer or resolve the client's query and respond accordingly. If a fix is necessary, an estimation of fix time will be calculated and the client will be advised. This fix can then be scheduled to an appropriate time period or ‘sprint cycle.’ If the solution has a testing environment known as ‘UAT’, the fix may be implemented there for client approval, before being transitioned to the production environment, and the ticket closed.

What are the Keys to a Successful Service Desk?

The Service Desk helps our clients to maximise the benefit they receive from a product or service, by ensuring it performs reliably, securely, and swiftly. To achieve this, users must feel confident with the support network around it.

This confidence can be instilled through several factors:

• Response times: Rapid response times are the hallmark of quality service. Even if a fix or answer is not immediately available, if the client receives a swift and courteous response, and is confident that there will be follow-up, they are reassured that their Service Desk team is engaged.
• Product Knowledge: Service Desk team members can offer expertise on a product or service that goes beyond the basics, and take time to work with users on all their queries. Achieving this assists with response times since a well-trained analyst is capable of returning not only a swift acknowledgment, but also a meaningful one
• Customer Knowledge: Analysts should not only know their products, but they should also know their customers. This does not just mean that they know the individuals that are raising the issues, but that they understand the journey the customer is on. How are they using the system? What are their processes? What are they aiming to achieve? Understanding the client’s needs helps the analysts during the triage process to prioritise tickets and act accordingly since they know the impact the issue being raised will have on the client.
• Empathy: Perhaps the most important skill of all is to have and demonstrate true empathy with the client. If an analyst is not sympathetic or indifferent to a client's needs they will fail to instil confidence in the customer, even if all the other factors are met.

How Can We Help?

The Virtual Forge’s Service Desk Team across Europe and the US have decades of customer experience and we are affectionately known as the ‘care experts’ within the company.

With in-depth knowledge of all supported systems and by undergoing continuous training, our team aims to deliver the best possible experience to our customers. Whatever may arise, with The Virtual Forge Service Desk team at your side, you’ll be back on track in no time. Contact us today, we’re always ready to help.