Triaging Tickets

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Purpose of this page

This page aims to walk you through some basic checks and items to tick off when working on the Needs Org and Triage queue in ZenDesk.

Overall Flow

graph TD G[Ensure correct form] --> A{Is it a Support Ticket?} A -->|Yes| B{Is the ticket tied to an org?} A -->|No| H[Check if it falls under 'Other Requests'] B -->|Yes| D{Does the ticket have an SLA?} B -->|No| J[Is it a Free User?] D -->|Yes| C[Done] D -->|No| F[Use SLA and Queue workflow: Take appropriate action] J --> |No| E[Use Needs Org workflow: Find and associate the organization] J --> |Yes| I[Does it quality for Support?] I --> |No| K[Set form to 'Community'] I --> |Yes| E

Applying the Correct Form

A ticket should have the correct form applied to it to help route it to the right set of individuals who can assist with that request.

Below is a list of the most commonly used Zendesk forms with a brief explanation regarding their usage:

Self-Managed: An issue where the customer is maintaining their own local instance of GitLab
SaaS (GitLab.com): An issue involving the GitLab hosted SaaS offering
SaaS Account: Single user account issue only, all others go to GitLab.com (SaaS).
Security: See when to transfer to security.
Accounts Receivable: refunds, VAT and invoices.
L&R (License and Renewals): any subscription, purchase, and customers portal issue not covered by AR form (in above point). See also L&R workflows.
Community: any ticket not entitled to support. Typically, Self-managed CE user, or SaaS free user request not listed as supported. See Handling Free User tickets for further instructions on how to handle free user tickets.
Professional Services: For tickets that should go to the Professional Services team, such as requests about the GitLab Learn platform(gitlab.edcast.com).

The following macros exist and should be used to change the form:

Handling Free User tickets

Free Users who are reporting Self-Managed or SaaS issues

Triage the Free User ticket and verify if they are a SaaS user who meets the support criteria outlined in the free users section of the statement of support.
If they do not meet the above criteria or the ticket is for a self-managed Free User, tickets that are New can be moved to the Community form, which will activate the Ticket::Autoresponder::Community tickets trigger (responds and solves the ticket). If the ticket is Open, then direct the customer to the GitLab community forum via the "Free User Request" macro and mark it "Solved”. If you wish to provide technical assistance to the user, then please do so via the GitLab community forum.

Free Users who are reporting L&R issues

Triage the Free User ticket and verify if the user’s issue relates to subscriptions or account/billing listed in the Applying the Correct Form section, change the form to the appropriate one so that a team member can deal with the request directly.

If the user is asking for assistance getting in contact with sales, you can use the "L&R" form.

If the request falls outside of such scenarios, see the Other Requests section, or direct the user to the GitLab community forum and the ticket marked as "Solved".

After applying the correct form

Apply the correct Problem type if possible (this may need to happen after looking up the organization information).
Use the Needs Org workflow to tie a ticket to the right organization.
With help from the Looking up customer details page to understand how and where you can find customer information from ZenDesk, Salesforce and the customer portal.
Check SLA and Zendesk views page for after an org is assigned.

US Federal tickets in Global Support Portal

Users of GitLab's US Federal Support offering may opt to raise a ticket in the Global Support Portal as well. The most common reason for this is the need for support outside of the US Federal's hours of operation. If during the triage process, a Global Agent comes across a ticket that is from an organization which appears to be a customer entitled to US Federal Support, the agent can work this case the same as they would any other ticket.

If there is a concern that the customer had intended to raise a ticket in the US Federal Support Portal and unintentionally created it in the Global Portal the agent may consider applying the General::US Federal Customer in Global macro to inform them that their request may be handled by a non-US Citizen and direct them to the relevant portal if that is a requirement.

Other Requests

We also receive non Support requests in our queue - if you see something not listed below or something you are unsure about, ask in the #support_escalations slack channel and make a MR to update the list below when you find out the answer.

Request	Workflow
Training	Redirect requester to Education from Professional Services
New Set Up/Installation	Follow the Passing a Lead to Sales workflow
Requests for swag	Ask in the #swag internal slack channel or direct to the FAQ for existing orders. For general requests for free swag, use the `General::Free Swag Request` Macro.
Questions related to jobs/openings	Redirect requester to Outbound Talent Acquisition Model page
Questions related to status of job application	Use the `General::Job Application Questions` macro and send a note to the internal `#talent acquisition` Slack channel.
Legal Questions and Concerns	Ask in the #legal internal slack channel
Missing Learning and Development Certificates	Direct requester to review Missed Certificate and contact `learning@` with a note about which certificate/knowledge assessment is missing.
Questions regarding GitLab Partner Program	This program is under Channel Partner. Kindly direct requester to contact `partnersupport@` or ask in #channel-programs-ops when unsure.