H2Desk

Reviewed by: Paul Schneider, Ph.D., April 2005
Published by: Heathco Software H2Desk
Requires: MySQL v3.23 or later, PHP v4 or later, ionCube encoder (included); web server; remote access via telnet/shell is helpful during installation; FTP access is helpful during installation
MSRP: US$199.00

When providing software and web based solutions, good customer service is one area that helps separate your solution from the crowd. If you wish to provide this service in an efficient manner, one essential item is a good help desk program. Help desk programs aim to provide your staff with an effective way of managing support requests and ensuring that responses to customer’s questions are timely and met with satisfaction. H2Desk is one such product that is designed to help you accomplish these goals.

I've reviewed and used a number of help desk systems in the past and the one thing that really impressed me about H2Desk was the user interface. Simply put, it is clean, crisp, straightforward and easy to use. This is especially important because when you provide help desk support, the last thing you want is a user to be confused by your help desk! While I loved the H2Desk interface, there is certainly more under the covers than just a pretty face.

Installation of H2Desk on my Linux server, running PHP 4x and MySQL, was virtually painless. Besides needing to know the usual database settings, and a small problem with the e-mail import which was resolved with a help desk request to H2Desk, I completed the installation with no trouble.

H2Desk's primary features are:

• Creating and responding to tickets
• Knowledge base
• Managing and configuring the system and users

All of these core features can be accessed by staff or by online customers. From the customer view, though you can access each of the primary features, you are severely limited to the appropriate areas only. As a customer you can primarily create new problem reports (they're called Tickets and can include file attachments), review your tickets, search the knowledge base and update your personal information. All of these options are extremely easy to use and are accessed through various icons and option selections. Although it is in your best interest, you don't have to create an account to create a ticket. E-mail notifications are sent to you when the ticket is updated and you can access your ticket updates via a link in the e-mail message. The system even supports the ability to e-mail tickets to a designated help address. Once the e-mail is imported a ticket will be automatically created and you'll receive an e-mail notice updating you about the ticket creation.

From a staff perspective, you have a wealth of options for your ticket management. Staff members can search tickets, set personal options for viewing tickets, respond to tickets, attach files to responses, insert knowledge base articles, perform mass operations over various tickets, forward tickets to other users or departments, change ticket priorities, mark tickets with flags, and more. The ticketing system is designed so tickets will be routed automatically or manually to various departments, thereafter allowing any individual within the department to work on the tickets. Having worked with systems that tie a ticket to a specific responder, I can tell you that tying tickets instead to departments can be a very good thing.

Overall, my favorite aspect of the ticketing process was the user interface. The items you need are clearly displayed and sub-items are easily accessed without cluttering the appearance. On the flip side, it would be nice to have a couple of additional features like an option for a staff member to enter time to resolve tickets and an accompanying report that details the information. For customers, the ability to send tickets via e-mail is nice, but unfortunately this does not extend to replies to the ticket.

H2Desk’s Knowledge Base is designed to help users help themselves. Staff members can create specific new knowledge base categories and then add articles which provide answers to related commonly asked questions. Like the rest of the program, this feature is easy to use from both customer and staff perspective. However, it is a little light on some of the management features. Missing is the ability to remove categories, move articles to different categories and cross-list them, as well as the option to flag ticket responses for inclusion in the knowledge base. Though not as robust as the ticketing portion of the product, it still serves its purpose.

Configuring the H2Desk system and its users is also quite easy. Do you see a trend here? The configuration options allow you to modify the appearance of the header and footer of the customer help desk page, set options for attachments, purging, problem escalations, modify e-mail response templates, change the style sheet and set ticket priority options among other things. Like most of the features in the system, changing any of these options are extremely easy though to be fair, a couple of settings do require some basic HTML knowledge.

Managing users and departments is equally easy. All of the basics are here, but probably the neatest thing is the ability to change individual user permissions for different departments and their management of different aspects of the ticket workflow and various features of H2Desk. Finally, there are a few other miscellaneous features such as a private messaging system for H2Desk operators, a personal calendar for reminding yourself about upcoming activities, and ticket statistics overall, by department and customer ratings.

So what kind of support do you get for your support system? As you have probably gathered, the product itself is pretty easy to use. However, the help system, while clear, certainly seems out of place. It is short and almost seems like an afterthought. Even so, the customer support makes up for it. Create a ticket on the H2Desk support site and you can expect a quick and helpful response. Speaking of help, one minor omission in H2Desk is that there is no way for customers to request a lost password. I wouldn't be surprised if this feature appears in a future upgrade!

Taking care of your customers is one of the surest ways to increase the success of any product or service. Although great support people are an essential part of the equation, without great support tools they are often overwhelmed and continuous improvement is stifled. H2Desk provides an affordable solution to your help desk needs with a simple and clean interface that will have you up and responding to support inquiries in no time. Recommended.

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