A while back we announced some changes that were happening at Sephone.  Changes that were bold.  Changes that were/are to improve our work flow, customer experiences and overall to make us a better company. Here is that post.

While implementing these changes, we introduced some new tools and prettied up some existing tools; all with the same goal.

Many of these tools were introduced in early 2010 & more in October 2010

• Sephone Chat Our new online customer support chat service
• my.Sephone.com Manage and view your admin area, current / past projects and other account info
• Sephone Status View the Status of Sephone Resources (servers, services, etc) and updates
• Sephone Blog Our Blog!
• Support.Sephone.com Best way to let us help you!

SUPPORT is our primary support ticket mechanism.  Whether our clients generate the ticket from the website, or we generate it for clients call or send us an email.

Some of the benefits of this system are: It creates and audit trail for us, and it replies back to the client in an email for all status updates that are performed on the ticket and will eventually be a link from the clients “my.Sephone.com” dashboard that acts as a knowledge base for our clients and our staff.

Support Tickets can range from problems to suggestions.  And in either instance, they are recorded and processed in the order they are received and based on the information that is provided in the ticket.

The ticket submission options are:

1. Just a Suggestion
2. Could you take a look at this sometime?
3. This has been bugging me and I’d like it done
4. I need this done fairly quickly
5. I cannot do ANYTHING until this is done

When we receive the ticket, during standard business hours (M-F, 8-5)

If options 1 ,2 or 3 are chosen; we would see the ticket and it is addressed as soon as possible and responded to no later than the end of the next business day.

If options 4 or 5 are chosen (M-F 8-5) we also see the ticket and if there was anything that could be done to resolve the issue, it would be.

After hours support is reserved for extreme instances for example if servers are unresponsive or mission critical web apps are not operating.

In each of the  5 options, the customer is sent a confirmation e-mail re-stating the ticket; and as the ticket is updated,  all updates sent via email.  With their my.Sephone.com account, customers can log in to their account and review ANY and ALL support tickets, and their resolutions for their reference.

A web technician will review the ticket info and respond according to the details provided.  If the ticket will be resolved by the next business day, a response will be generated through the ticketing system, so filling out the form with a real email address is required.

Note: This post isn’t to inform you of changes to the levels of support we offer, since we haven’t changed them; but we have changed the mechanisms in which our clients can reach us and improved the ways we are able to respond.

Recommendation -

If you are entering in to a busy period, give your site a walk-through, so if you do see something that requires attention, yours or ours, there is ample time before the rush starts.

Thank you for your help in being efficient and productive in solving your issues and questions by making use of tools like  (my.Sephone.com,  support.Sephone.com and status.Sephone.com) to identify if it is a known issue, or if it needs to be reported.

As more information regarding our my.Sephone.com account manager is made available to our clients- we will notify you via the blog, email and other notifications.  In the mean time- you can contact us to obtain access to your account to get a sneak peak.

We can never say enough, “Thank You”  for your business and allowing us to be your trusted partner navigating the web.
We are looking forward to a Happy New Year for All!