When will my Project be done?

We are regularly getting questions about the Support System Process and Status on Projects. This document is designed to clear up some of the confusion and hopefully make it easier for you to better understand how ILGM and it’s agents handle Tickets and prioritize Work Order Tasks.

It is extremely important that every client read and understand these processes. This will defiantly remove some frustrations you may have as well as keep YOUR project on task and completed in the expected time frame!

There are two systems that we use:

The Customer Support Center (http://support.ilgm.com)

Customer Project Management System ('http://projects.ilgm.com)

Between these 2 systems, this is where 99% of all your information, support, project data and invoicing can be found.

How we manage new tickets:

The Customer Support Center

This is your first stop when you need something done or fixed. You'll send an email to support@ilgm.com or sign in and add a New Ticket with your request or question.

Once we receive a ticket, we evaluate it and categorize it as a question, work request or communication on an existing project.

As of this post, stats show that 45% of all tickets are responded to within 1 hour (typically a question) of receiving the request and over all we respond to all other tickets (typically work requests) within 24-30 hours, basically the next business day.

New questions may be addressed by any of the 4 support agents and existing tickets will be addressed by the original responding agent. Project communications will most always be handled by the lead agent on your project.

In order to keep continuity flowing between clients and projects, we try to assign new project requests to the agent you have most worked with. This way the client/agent relationship can develop and mature over time making it much easier for the agent to understand that clients business and needs. This has proven to be the most efficient way of handling anywhere form 4-500 requests/'mo between 3-4 agents.

Ticket Stats:

All new tickets are looked at by the next available agent. If the agent can answer the question they will, otherwise they will assign it to the appropriate agent.

Existing tickets are typically addressed by the agent originally assigned to the ticket.

The lifecycle of a ticket:

1. When a new ticket or a response to an existing ticket comes into the system it is automatically categorized as OPEN/NEW.
2. When an agent responds to the ticket and they need more information, they will send their question(s) and change the status to PENDIN.
3. When an agent responds to the ticket and they DON'T need more information, they will send their response and change the status to SOLVED.
4. Why a ticket my be set to ON-HOLD. These are typically project tickets that the agent knows the customer needs more time to respond or gather collateral like photos or copy.

Status Definition & actions.

OPEN/NEW Tickets: These will remain in the Open status until an agent responds. OPEN tickets are prioritized by reviewing date/time. You will get an email notification stating that we have received the request and an agent will be assigned shortly.

PENDING Tickets: When an agent responds and they need more information, your ticket will be moved into the pending status and you will immediately get an email with the agent question(s). If you do not respond to your ticket within 24hrs the system will automatically send you a reminder. If you do not respond to your ticket within 5 days, the system will send you a second reminder. If you do not respond to your ticket within 7 days the system will tag your ticket with "No Response" and an agent will either put it back to pending to start the cycle over again or change the status to CLOSED. Typically an agent will cycle once - giving you 2 weeks (14 days) to respond to a ticket.

SOLVED Tickets: These are tickets that the agent has deemed completed and they manually set the status to SOLVED. You'll get a notification stating that your ticket has been resolved. You have 24hrs to add any additional information to the ticket before it is CLOSED.

CLOSED Tickets: These are tickets that have been set to SOLVED for 24hrs and the system will automatically change the status to CLOSED. Once a ticket is set to the Close, it can no longer be updated. If you try to update it, the system will automatically create a new ticket.

ON-HOLD Tickets: Just as stated above, these are tickets that an agent has put on-hold to allow the client to gather all the needed collateral we may need to finish your project.

Prioritizing Projects and Work Requests:

One of the biggest questions we get is "When will my project be done?". Now that you understand how tickets are responded to, you can easily see that ticket requests and especially project are EXTREMELY dependent on the Client (You). Yes, we stay very busy - but for the past 20+ years we have developed a very functional support and project management process and once a ticket is deemed a project and costs have been approved, it goes something like this:

1. The Project is created in the Project Management System at 'http://projects.ilgm.com and tasks are assigned to the project. An estimated start date it typically communicated to the client.
2. Before the project start date, the agent may ask for additional information, photos, document, copy, etc.
3. Once an agent starts on your project, your project is top priority for them and they will keep the project ACTIVE until your project is completed or the agent needs more information/collateral. During the course of the project you will be notified of tasks created and completed and the time it took for each. In the Project Management System you can also (at 'anytime) look at the status of the project and each individual task, including total accumulated time. You can see the status of the tasks and the number of hours/minutes it took to complete each tasks.
4. If the agent completes the project, they will either respond to an existing ticket or create a new ticket (in the support system) letting you know the project is complete and ask you to verify that everything has been done to your expectations.

PLEASE READ CAREFULLY!
An agent will typically work 4-5 good projects at any given time. These active projects are their top priority! An agent will only start a project if they know they can handle the workload. An agent will add a new project to their workload about every 2 weeks. With 4 agents working full time, that is 15-20 active projects that we are working on. It's extremely important that you respond to questions or requests for collateral in a speedy fashion - even if you need time, just let the agent know that you need time to gather up the necessary information to keep your project active!

5. If an agent needs more information or collateral - they will either respond to an existing ticket or create a new PENDING ticket requesting the information needed. At this point, the agent will start work on a new/different project.
6. VERY IMPORTANT:If you respond during the 7 day PENDING period with what the agent needs, the agent will finish their current task and start right back on your project, keeping your project moving forward and on schedule. Typically within a day or 2 at the most.
7. If you do not respond within 7 days your project automatically goes into a ON-HOLD status and dropped from the agents active workload. Once it is put ON-HOLD it automatically goes to the END of the overall Projects List and last in priority. It stays there until you respond in some form. Once we get your response with the information we need, your project is immediately put back into PENDING and will be picked up by your assigned agent once his/her current work load permits. This can be within a couple of days or as far out as 2-3 weeks. That is why it is EXTREMELY important to respond quickly when an agent sends you questions or requests for more information!