Remedy Categories
Previous System
The previous Remedy system used 6 categories that were independent of one another (i.e. what was selected in 1 category had no affect on the other categories). This meant that for each problem, a user could select an entry from 1 or more of those 6 categories in order to describe the customer's problem.
This system allows for a fairly good description of the current problem - a user could identify up to 6 relevant pieces of information about the problem. However, it had not worked well for reporting purposes and can be challenging for new users.
Change in New System
The new system is using Remedy built-in mechanism: Category, Type and Item (CTI). The Category menu is usually a fairly broad description and the Type and Item narrow down the description. In the new system, what you select in the Category menu determines what is available in the Type menu; which then determines what is in the Item menu. This process helps guide the user to an appropriate categorization of a case. An example might be:
- Category: Email Software
- Type: Outlook
- Item: Calendar
The new version of Remedy actually uses two sets of the Category, Type and Item (or CTI):
Customer Reported: This is used to describe how the customer is reporting their problem.
Resolution: This is used to categorize the actual solution or resolution to the problem.
Often times these will be the same (i.e. the customer calls to have their Hawk ID Password reset and that is what we do to solve the problem). Other times though the customer may call for one thing, but the resolution is something different.
For example, a customer may call indicating that they are having a problem connecting to UI Wireless; so the Customer Reported CTI would indicate a UI Wireless issue. However, upon further troubleshooting it may be determined that the customer's Hawk ID has been disabled; which would be reflected in the Resolution CTI.
Why the Two Sets of Categories
The two sets of categories is actually based on the industry standard IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL). The purpose is to capture how the customer is asking about the problem as well as the actual resolution (or root cause) of the problem. Capturing how the customer is asking a question can help in training, documentation, Knowledge Management and better understanding how the customer is interacting with an IT system. Identifying the actual resolution or root cause can be used to design or fix keys problems and thereby reduce future calls.