Email Support Ticket Process

Regularly monitor the JIRA Service Desk queue to make sure all SLAs are met.

• All New and Unassigned tickets must be given a first response within 2 hours. 

• Some installers are given priority service - your SS ticket priority field will be automatically set once the organization name is populated; you may need to refresh the ticket to see priority change

  • These tickets should be completed as soon as possible and take precedence over other tickets.

  • If the "needs config" field is used to create a linked config ticket, that ticket will also be automatically marked high priority. 

  • Note, if you create a linked ticket manually, you'll need to mark it high priority manually too.

• Someone is typically assigned to monitoring the queue and assigning tickets as appropriate - otherwise, we recommend all agents check the Unassigned Queue every 20 mins. 

Most tickets have specific processes you should follow, however below is an overview.  

 First update the essential ticket fields:

• Fill out the Assignee field with your name. You can do this by clicking on “Assign to me” 

• Confirm that the "Reporter" field is filled with customer's contact details. (This may initially be listed as @goEverBright if the message was forwarded from a staff person).  Note that some ticket types - like EverBright onboarding tickets do not include customer contact info, so always refer to the ticket's SOP for guidance.

• Ensure that the "Organization" field is filled out accordingly. In case the Organization can’t be entered, please go to Customers tab on JIRA and search for the Organization to find the right name, or add it if it isn’t added yet.  If a channel partner, use the channel manager's name

• If related to EverBright financing, add "EB" to the "label field" on the right

• Check the "channel field" and make sure phone, email, or chat is selected - or select multiple channels if you needed to use a combination of channels to resolve the original request

• Add anyone who should be kept in the loop as a watcher (eyeball icon at the top right of the ticket) 

  • However, if account managers should be looped in, send them a message on slack or MS Teams.  You may find the list of accounts and their managers in SalesForce or the support dashboard in QuickSight

Then determine the "Request Type."   Here are 9 request types:

1. General Inquiry

   • This covers all questions about software navigation, features, usage, as well as all other inquiries that don’t fit into other categories. As a rule of thumb, if a ticket is yet to be categorized; meaning, if the request is vague or does not fall under any of the request types, it may first be categorized under General Inquiry. This can then be updated later on. More information and examples of General Inquiry tickets can be found here.

2. /wiki/spaces/SS/pages/694026241

   • These are tickets with concerns that imply that the software is not working as it should or there is a question on a technical request, like how to properly format an API request. Support’s key role is to rule out the possible root cause, and ensure that the issue is not a byproduct of a user-error, or a browser-related, or hardware-related issue, before forwarding the concern to dev.  More information and example of Technical Support tickets and examples can be found /wiki/spaces/SS/pages/694026241.

3. Industry-wide data change

   • These are data change requests that affect all businesses in the platform. Examples include adding, editing, or removing solar equipment, equipment manufacturers, and incentives.
     Here’s how tickets requesting to add, edit, or remove incentives should be handled:
     Send a reply to the customer to let them know we received their request and are now working on it. Then, create a CS ticket for the configuration team. Keep in touch with the customer for any follow ups or additional information needed, and with the configuration team for updates. SS ticket will be ready to close once CS ticket is placed in UAT status.
     
     Here are two other specific industry-wide data change requests, and how they should be handled: 
     
     i. Adding or updating SRECs. This can be done by Support as outlined by the process /wiki/spaces/SS/pages/532447263.
     ii. Adding Equipment. Support will maintain communication on the ticket and create a CS ticket according to the process here.

4. Company-specific data change

   • ^{These are data change requests that only affect the reporter’s organization. This includes adding, editing, or removing a financial product, product rules, contract templates, etc).}

     ^{Here’s how company-specific data change requests should be handled:}

     ^{i. Support will collect all the needed documents and will attach to the ticket} 

     ^{ii. Support will maintain communication on SS ticket and create other required tickets as outlined}/wiki/spaces/SS/pages/531791935^{. Here are how some specific types of company-specific data change requests are handled:}

5. Project-specific data change

These are data change requests that are only applicable to specific projects. This usually involves updating data on a specific customer site. Most of these are un-archive requests or updating legal contact information.

i. For requests to update legal contact information, refer to financier.
ii. For requests to unarchive customer site, follow the unarchive request /wiki/spaces/SS/pages/1412661.

6. Account Management

• These are inquiries on billing, cancellation, subscription changes, and requests for company/team trainings, status checks, inquiries about EB, etc).
  
  i. For cancellation requests, follow the /wiki/spaces/SS/pages/81002497. Please make sure to slack the Account Manager as a heads up. 

  • An organizations Account Owner can be found on the Support Salesforce Dashboard in Quicksight or in SalesForce.

  
  ii. For requests to update billing information - send instructions on how customers can update their billing information here.
  
  iii. For training requests, or request about joining the platform please have them sign up for time by following this link.
  
   

7. Onboarding

• These are emails automatically sent to Support to initiate the /wiki/spaces/SS/pages/2408251549 to the platform or/wiki/spaces/SS/pages/2459828319
  

8. Feature Requests

• These are enhancement and feature requests that may include but are not limited to: suggestions to improve the UI, adding features on certain project phases, and so on.
  For new ideas, and feature requests, Support will document the request according to the process /wiki/spaces/SS/pages/2468970577
  

9. Non-Platform Tickets (trade shows, resumes, trying to sell us something, etc.)

1. NOTE: If this message seems like it really might need attention, send an internal message to the Support Supervisor for evaluation 

2. Customer Info:

   1. Request Participants: None

   2. Organization: Non-platform Emails

3. Assignee: yourself

4. Reporter: Anonymous (Setting this will help reduce further email on this event/item/request)

5. Request Type: Non-Platform Request

6. Status

   1. Closed

   2. Won't Do

   3. Non-Platform Request

   4. Other

Send an initial reply to to the customer

Here are types of initial replies:

1. Probing questions - use if we need more details to proceed with the request

2. First step to resolution - if we’re able to narrow down the issue right away, we can immediately send a resolution or a suggestion the customer can try.

3. A general initial response - Since we have a 2 hour SLA for all incoming emails, some emails need more time for investigation before we can send a troubleshooting step or needed probing questions. In these cases, we send out a general initial response to let them know that we received their request and are now looking into it. Let them know as well that we’ll be in touch right away once we have more news.

   1. For these cases, make sure to toggle the status from Waiting for Customer back to Waiting for Support. This is because we are yet to send a resolution for these tickets.

Follow-up with the customer regularly. 

Important note about sending messages to customers: 

1. Comments will be shared with anyone listed in "Reporter" or "Request Participants" fields

2. Any edits you make to your message after hitting 'send' won't be sent to the customer.  So be sure to proofread first.

A ticket can be closed when:

• Customer has confirmed that the issue is resolved

• We believe the issue is resolved, and at least one attempt to confirm with the customer has been made. If we don’t get a reply 24 hours after we send a confirmation, the ticket can be closed.

• When we can't proceed without customer input (additional details, a more thorough description of what has happened), and customer has been unresponsive after we’ve attempted to follow up at least twice (2x).

• When there is an active low-priority dev ticket

Here is more detail on closing tickets