Melbourne-based Wesley College has transformed the helpdesk services it offers to 3500 students and 600 staff across three campuses.
The college was struggling to manage interaction between the IT front desk staff, network support team and users and, according to the head of IT services, Chris van der Weyden, was relying on a cobbled-together solution which couldn't keep up with demand.
"Keeping track of service calls was even harder because we didn't have a single point of contact for helpdesk services," Van der Weyden said. The challenge for the college was creating a system capable of satisfying the needs of two groups of IT staff - front desk and network support.
"Because students would arrive at the front desk and want service, we needed a system where data could be entered rapidly while staff engaged in conversation with the end users," Van der Weyden said.
"The network support team needed an interface that allowed jobs to be logged from phone calls."
The solution deployed was FrontRange's Heat software suite.
Van der Weyden selected the suite because it integrated with an existing SQL database platform.
"We tried to implement it ourselves but the product didn't really take off until training was introduced," he said.
"We now have a situation where end users can rely on calling or even e-mailing the service desk, knowing the information will be absorbed, prioritized and acted upon."
Built-in SLAs and escalation rules set up as part of deployment have also helped to increase the transparency of the system for end users and reduced the time taken between logging and resolution of a call.
"With service levels built into the software, we are now able to turn our attention to the most urgent jobs being logged," Van der Weyden said. The success of Heat has led the college's registrar's department to consider the FrontRange CRM product GoldMine.
"GoldMine will help us manage our customer relationships more effectively by enabling us to maintain contact with people in need of information," Van der Weyden said.
Plans are also in place to extend the use of the Heat incident management system beyond the IT group to encompass the college's maintenance department.