Click the links to the topics outlined below to learn more information:

Adding Ticket Notes

Importing Notes

Exporting Notes

Ticket Note Functions

WebGuest Update Feature

Adding Ticket Notes

Help Desk notes can be added to tickets in HotH. This area of the software provides a communication channel for engineers and agents working on service desk tickets, and for Customers wishing to contact agents directly. The Note automatically records the date and time of creation, the note Author and the Status of the ticket at the time the Note was written. The Notes tab sits at the top or bottom of the ticket screen, and provides a full chronological audit trail.

Manual NotesInternal Notes

When adding a manual note, the decision can be made as to whether to keep the note as an internal message, so that only support staff can view it. Alternatively, you can enable Customers to view notes on tickets logged via the self-service web portal, in order to provide an additional communication channel and a level of transparency. This is controlled by the Internal tick box, and when selected, the note is Internal. Notes default to being Internal on creation:If the Internal tick box is selected on the ticket note, the note will be hidden from the Customer (WebGuest). If the tick box is deselected, the Note will be visible on the ticket when viewed by the Customer via the self-service portal.

Important Notes

HotH enables Notes to be flagged as Important by support staff so they are instantly identifiable.Once the Important tick box is selected on the Note, the Important sign is displayed next to the Note in the Note trail on the ticket:

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Importing Notes

HotH has the ability to load external Notes directly into the databases. You can therefore download data from any existing databases and populate the HotH databases.

In addition, HotH also has the ability to export your Notes data from the HotH database to a CSV file, which you can learn more about on the Exporting Notes Guide.

The files to be imported must be flat files of comma-separated values. Each line in the text file represents a HotH record of a particular type. The first characters in each line indicate the type of record to be loaded. You should also note that special rules apply to some fields, please take advice from Support before loading new data type. You can use Import to execute a SQL string, but again please take advice from support@houseonthehill.com before doing this.

Note: Tickets and Notes are loaded into the current Ticket Folder. Any Notes referenced in the Tickets should belong to the current Folder. HotH does not make these checks.

How to import the file

In the WebServer, go to Import CSV from Settings.Select the file to import records and click Import. If there are errors they will be listed. You need to review the errors. The error log is listed to the file suppdesk.err. If there are no errors you can navigate away.

In the Windows interface the Import CSV option is on the Database ribbon tab/menu. You need to navigate to where the import file is located.

Import Format

Excel column headings are supplied below to assist. You do not need to supply data for every field, just enter those you need. (Though there are some validation rules, these are not documented here.)

Dates should be entered as DD/MM/YYYY for UK format and MM/DD/YYYY if US format is in use.

Ticket Note Record – Type ER

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Exporting Notes

You can export the current Notes into a named file. The output records have the same layout as the corresponding Import records. This is useful if you want to create an import file; create a ‘dummy’ record, populating the required fields with discernible text, such as REF in a reference field. The exported data can then be used as a template for the import layout.

How to Export Notes

To export data, show the Notes records in the summary and filter the list as required.

In the WebServer, navigate to Settings > Export CSV File, then select the “Calls” tick-box; this will then offer the option to View the output. Now, you can open or save the file. Ticket Note records are recorded under type ‘ER‘.In the Windows interface, you can export the Notes records in the summary list using Export CSV on the File ribbon tab/Menu. Additionally, in the Windows version you can use the Export CSV option on the Database menu to export more Notes records.Tick the Calls box, click the OK button and then choose a location and file name for the export file. The default is export.txt on the HotH directory. If this file already exists, you must confirm to replace the existing file. On completion, you can view the export file before being returned to the main window. Navigate to the bottom of the .txt file and your Notes database will be found under “Notes (ER)“.

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Ticket Note Functions

Note Details

The Note displays relevant information at the top of the screen:

Contact Buttons

Contact buttons are automatically generated based on the Customer, Assignee and “Raised by” details:When clicked, the email template is automatically generated with the correct recipient in the To field, and the Note details in the email body. If Pause Before Sending is enabled on the email template, then the mail can be edited before sending:

Additional Function Buttons

Other function buttons on notes include:

Copy and Paste Images into Notes

The copy and paste of images feature is only available for use depending on the web browser version and the Editor version. To figure out which version of the Editor you are using, refer to the table below and compare to the toolbar on your version.

Toolbar	Editor Version
	Legacy
	Imperavi V2
	Imperavi V3

Once you’ve identified your Editor version, refer to the following table to determine the image Copy/Paste functionality that’s supported on your browser.

To copy and paste into Notes, Agents or Customers can simply click on the Note and select the HTML tick box, then paste the image using either right-click or Ctrl+V:

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WebGuest Update Feature

A query we often receive from customers is how best to alert the HotH staff when the end user has added a new note to a ticket. HotH already has features to assist with this, such as the automatic email “On New Ticket note to assignee”, and the envelope icon that appears in the ticket summary border.

However, HotH provides another feature, the ‘WebGuest Update’, that can help automate the process and progress the workflow on a ticket.

Overview and Setup

The WebGuest Update feature allows a status to automatically move onto another status (the ‘Child Category’) when either:

1. A new Note is added to the ticket by a WebGuest
2. A new Note is added to the ticket automatically by an inbound email

This requires two flags to be set on the (first) status you would like the ticket to change from.

1. In the Dependency section of the Service Level Management Status Configuration panel, set the Child Category to the Status you would like the ticket to change to:

   

2. In the Actions Section of the Status Configuration panel – tick the WebGuest Update box.

   

Operation

In the example above we have created a new child category “Information Received”.  The WebGuest update flag has been set on a status “Waiting for Information” which would typically be a status code that tickets are designated when awaiting feedback from an end user. So, tickets sitting on status “Waiting for Information” will automatically be moved to “Information Received” under either of the conditions listed in the overview above.

In addition you could configure an “Email to Assignee” on the resulting status, or make sure that this status is included in the default view of tickets that staff are using. For added emphasis the status could even be attributed a specific colour.
Another use of this may be to flag the Closed status as “WebGuest Update” and give it a child status so that notes added to closed tickets are not missed.

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