Supernova Award Category

The Problem

Prior to our conversion to BMC’s FootPrints Service Core & Asset Core system, we had been using a very old, outdated incident-tracking product that was never configured to be anything more than a basic ticketing system. We also weren’t able to implement a Problem Manager role to perform trend analysis and root cause identification. We realized we needed a more efficient and effective problem/incident resolution system, including updating our customers with Global Incident notifications which prevent countless calls to the helpdesk.

The Solution

The initiative involved changing the way our entire support structure did business, changing the way we receive and track support requests (the new FP ticketing system) to updating and automating the actual process of incident resolution and escalation by utilizing Service Cores' built in IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) processes.The process involved a complete overhaul of how we document support incidents, which was vital because we customized the entire support ticket form to capture an incredibly thorough amount of user and incident data.We selected these products for several reasons:

• The excellent support offered by BMC and their support partner Rightstar and we have not been disappointed.
• The robust reporting features and live metric features
• The system configuration flexibility and the many customizable features that we could tailor to our unique business model.

The results

Since FootPrints Service Core has streamlined the support process and made entering a support ticket quicker and more efficient we are able to field more incoming support calls quicker than ever before.  Another contributing factor to these improvements is the increased usage of the self-service system by our customers. Agents and supervisors can more easily track their support tickets (cases) thanks to the efficient Home Page layout and setup in Service Core.

Metrics

The amount of calls in the phone queue with wait times greater than 30 minutes has reduced by 50%. Overall average wait times have shown improvement as well with a 20% reduction. The number of calls responded to have increased by 12%. Additionally, incident and problem resolution has improved - the number of aged incidents (older than 3 days) has reduced by 65%.

The Technology

BMC Software’s FootPrints Service Core and Asset Core system

Disruptive Factor

To our organization, this was a huge step forward in the evolution of our support ecosystem.  Up until now, we had been using a very old, outdated incident-tracking product that was never configured to be anything more than a basic ticketing system.

FootPrints Service core and Asset Core were a huge leap forward into the future for our organization in which we went from simply logging support tickets to implementing a formal Incident Management system (including formal internal and external escalation processes), a Problem Management system, a Change Management system and an Asset Management system in which we can track assets in more than 40,000 restaurants.

Shining Moment

One of the most important things that the improved reporting does for us is to quickly identify a possible trending support issue (such as a problem with a new published menu), right down to a possible root cause (software, hardware update, etc.).