Search
Newsletter
Guide to the Riverbank help desk
The Riverbank help desk resolves over 6000 help desk incidents per year (2007-08). That’s about one incident every twenty minutes of every working day.
One grey area is the boundary between help desk and chargeable work. When is an issue a help desk issue, and therefore covered by your support contract, and when is it chargeable? The aim of this guide is to clarify this area.
Help desk
Help desk is there to resolve problems that prevent you from continuing to work normally.
Help desk issues can be notified to Riverbank by phone (01844 278036), by e-mail (support@riverbank.co.uk) or via our web site – go to www.riverbank.co.uk/support and click ‘Help!’.
Help desk incidents are usually solved by providing you with verbal or written instructions. If this is not possible we can take remote control of any internet-connected computer to help resolve the problem. We usually have a permanent remote control link to your server(s).
Helpdesk procedure
The way your helpdesk incident is dealt with is shown in the diagram below.
Your incident goes to first line support. First line support enables routine problems to be fixed quickly. If your problem cannot be resolved quickly it is escalated to second line support.
Occasionally incidents will need assistance from our own specialists or from vendors. This means that there will probably be a delay in finding a fix, but you should be kept informed at all stages.
Priorities
| Not urgent | You can work around the problem or it only causes a minor inconvenience. |
| Urgent | You cannot work, or it is an issue that affects more than one person. |
| Critical | The issue stops the entire business, eg server failure. |
Help desk limits
There have to be practical limits on what the help desk can do under the terms of a support contract. Please note:
1. Problems on help desk will be referred to product specialists if necessary. If we are still unable to solve a problem and either a site visit is required or you have to return the equipment to us, this will be chargeable work.
2. To provide a timely and efficient service to all clients, there is a per-incident time limit of one hour. If we cannot resolve an issue within this time we reserve the right to transfer the work out of help desk, and if necessary to charge for the time required. We will confirm this with you before we start charging.
3. Occasionally, some tasks will be of a degree of complexity that they cannot be resolved by the help desk. An example would be where a disk has crashed and the manufacturer has replaced the disk, leaving you with a blank computer. Riverbank could provide you with a checklist to reinstall the operating system and reconfigure the computer, but you may not have the necessary skills to carry out all the steps. In these cases the work will become chargeable.
Supported hardware and software
We work with a defined set of hardware and software products. These are products we know work well and that our technical team is trained to support. The list of these supported products is available on the Riverbank web site at the following link:
http://www.riverbank.co.uk/home/services/install/riverbank-approved-equipment
You need to ensure that any specialist or unsupported hardware or software you use is covered by its own support contract. We can then liaise directly with your supplier to help provide complete support to you. Because we have no control over the level of support provided by other suppliers we reserve the right to refer you to them for support.
Chargeable work
If you are making a change to your system and you need our help, we are pleased to help but it is chargeable work. Examples of chargeable work are assistance with installations such as a new server, a new computer or a new printer.
Clients on Managed Network support
For clients on Managed Network support we will carry out minor network management tasks as part of the help desk work. These are:
- Add/edit/delete users (server only – PC setup not included)
- Changing user passwords
- Adding or amending e-mail addresses on your server
- Creating or amending e-mail distribution groups
These tasks generally take only a few minutes. If a particular task is likely to take more than 15 minutes, then in fairness to all our clients we have to reserve the right to transfer the work out of help desk, and if necessary to charge for the time taken. We will notify you in advance before charging.
Examples
| Problem | Help desk or chargeable work |
| My printer has stopped working. | Help desk |
| I’m installing a new printer and I can’t get it to work. | Chargeable work. You are making a change to your system. |
| My mobile phone has stopped synchronising. | Help desk. We will also liaise with your mobile phone company on your behalf if necessary, so that we get a solution for you. There is no charge for this. |
| I’m trying to set up my mobile phone to collect e-mail, and it won’t synchronise. | Chargeable work. You are making a change to your system. |
| I’m wondering what sort of printer to buy. Can you advise? | Help desk |
| I’ve lost a file. Can you help me recover it? | Help desk |
| I’ve lost all my files. Can you help me recover them? | If the problem is that you need to restore your files, this is help desk.
If the problem is that your server’s disk has failed, it will be chargeable work because:
|
Fixed cost support
If you have a fixed-cost IT support contract the issue of ‘chargeable work’ does not apply. The only work that is not covered by your fixed-cost contract is new projects. Any new projects will the separately costed and agreed with you in advance.Outsourced IT
If you have an Outsourced IT contract all your IT costs are covered by an agreed monthly fee. Any additional work will be a new contract and an adjustment in your monthly fee will be agreed with you in advance.
Our service level commitment
Our commitment to our clients with any support contract is that we will endeavour to reach the following targets:
1. We aim to answer every call immediately. You will not be left in a telephone queue or forced to go through tiresome lists of options. If no technical person is available when you call we will log the details of the problem and issue you with an incident number.
2. To get a technical person working on your help desk issue as soon as we possibly can, and within a maximum of two hours.
3. We aim to achieve a same-day fix for 80% of help desk incidents (2007 = 60%).
4. We aim to resolve all incidents within two days. This is to allow time for us to liaise with other suppliers and get a response from them.
Premium clients
If you subscribe to our premium service your helpdesk incident goes straight to the top of the queue. We promise to get a technical person working on your issue within one hour.
Our guarantee
All our work comes with a no-quibble guarantee. This means that if we have done something wrong, or our work did not come up to the standard you could reasonably expect, tell us within 30 days and we won’t ask you to pay it.