If you could change one thing in your MSP help desk to bring order to it and increase revenue, what would it be?
Look no further than adding a dispatcher!
If you’re currently scaling your MSP service desk to over five technicians, you may face a challenge of instability without someone in that role.
Bringing on a dispatcher is a huge preventative measure for things getting messier as you grow. Dispatchers improve your MSP help desk by ensuring order in your MSP. This supervisor role creates regularity in your system, ensures accountability for the completion of tasks, and helps to untangle any chaotic web of mismanaged tickets.
We’ve gained a great deal of insight on this topic here at Support Adventure in consulting and providing outsourced staff for many MSPs.
So keep reading to better understand the areas of your business where the dispatcher best works their magic so that your company increases revenue, customer satisfaction and productivity.
How the MSP Dispatcher Role Improves Help Desk Services
Just because you have a system in place for your MSP help desk, doesn’t mean your staff will follow it correctly.
Enter The Dispatcher.
As an MSP, it is important to have someone working dispatch in order to enforce the following system procedures and processes:
- Proper documentation – A big part of keeping your help desk in good health.
- Ticketing system – The organized communication channel and escalation mechanism for running a successful help desk.
Download our free ticket writing guide here!
A dispatcher will help these aspects of your service desk run smoothly and ensure procedures are being followed. They also serve as a bridge in emergency situations between you and your client, providing that extra care they’ll love.
Their positive influence is most evident in:
- Ticketing systems and workflow (delegation, escalation and statuses)
- Customer satisfaction (day-to-day and emergency procedures)
- Improving environment and systems (reaching the sweet spot in productivity)
Dispatcher Coordination and Delegation Creates a Distraction-Free Environment
A great benefit of the dispatcher for the MSP help desk is that they make sure things get done by directing the flow of tickets and their progress. Everything from the initial ticket intake to solving issues is coordinated by them, as well as following up on customers’ needs and documentation.
All of this is handled smoothly because it’s the dispatcher, not the technician, that communicates with the clients. They create a corresponding ticket and assign it to a technician. This helps to:
- Prevent cherry picking tickets by technicians, which only eventually leads to a bunch of ignored tickets.
- Ensure escalated issues get to the right address and not lost.
- Check the status of the tickets.
- Follow up with clients for additional information.
Let’s break these objectives of the dispatcher down a little further.
Regulating the intake and delegation of tickets.
Instead of risking technicians cherry-picking tickets that result in balls getting dropped, have a dispatcher regulate the intake and delegation of incoming tickets.
Using systems like Freshdesk or Zendesk, a dispatcher can look at ticket queues and assign tickets to a tech who has the most availability or expertise to solve an issue.
Escalate the right way so that no tickets get lost!
Relying on the Microsoft Teams chat for escalating incidents is asking for a disaster. Tickets get lost and customers are left hanging. And the worst part is that no one is held accountable.
With a dispatcher, they operate as a link between the technician initiating an escalation and the busy senior tech who a ticket needs to reach.
If a junior technician is not able to solve a ticket in 30 minutes, they can put it back in the unassigned queue with the following information:
- A list of steps taken to try to solve the issue.
- A reason as to why they couldn’t solve it.
- Any additional info needed from the client.
The dispatcher then assigns the ticket to a senior technician and makes sure to follow up on the issue once it’s solved to ensure maximum customer satisfaction.
Ticket Status and Comprehensive Customer Care
In the rush of things, technicians can sometimes forget to update the status of a ticket. This might seem like such a small thing, but the significance of the ticket status in customer satisfaction and productivity should be taken seriously.
The dispatcher is checking the status of all tickets regularly in order to call back customers in case some information is missing.
From our experience, proper ticket notes for maximum clarity should strict procedures like the ones listed below:
- Change ticket status to “In Progress” when _______ happens.
- Change ticket status to “Resolved” when ________ occurs.
- Escalate ticket to (person) when a technician cannot resolve the ticket within __ minutes.
- Include a last line that states one of the following:
- NEXT STEPS ________
- WAITING FOR ________
- ESCALATION REQUIRED
- TICKET RESOLVED
- Always schedule any necessary follow-ups or next steps on the calendar.
- Only send internal notes to a client on a ticket when ___________.
Distraction-Free Environment for your Technicians
Most technicians have witnessed the horrible effects of how ring groups kill productivity.
Replacing this system with a dispatch helps to delegate tasks more smoothly and follow up on statuses, boosting productivity!
In effect, you’ll have a distraction-free environment where techs are able to maintain dedicated focus and work without stressing out each time the phone rings!
Customer Satisfaction in Day-to-day and Emergency Procedures
It is not easy to keep your help desk working in synchronicity. No matter how much you get into the nuts and bolts when creating procedures, things can still fail in practice. Technicians can neglect important steps that make the procedures work.
This is where the dispatcher steps in. They can be like a mother prodding their child to make sure they’ve finished their chores until they develop the habit to do so.
As a result, clients will receive spotless servicing from the moment they come forth with a problem until you deliver the great news back to them!
The Dispatcher’s Role in Emergency Response Procedures
How MSPs respond in emergency situations can make or break the success of their client relationships.
Dispatchers play a crucial role in handling emergency procedures and providing successful responses that will not let your client down.
All-hands-on-deck situations require working in synchronicity throughout your MSP. Clear communication and unambiguous responsibility delegations are a precursor to handling emergencies well.
Arm your dispatchers with knowledge about the emergency procedure so that they can make sure everybody is doing their part in a time of crisis. They should understand the following:
- Notify everyone in management and the executive level. Anybody who is a stakeholder in the company needs to be informed.
- Get the best tech on it immediately.
- Ensure procedures are followed.
- Check-in with the client in intervals of 15 to 30 minutes.
This will not only help you fix the issue successfully, but it will also make the customer feel prioritized. After all, no matter how fast, smart or technically capable your staff is, the things clients will remember most is how they were treated in the process.
Improving Environment and Systems
Working as a bridge between the systems and the techs working under them, dispatchers are a valuable source of information. They have insight on how you can upgrade your system, get more productivity from your techs and make the whole help desk provide better service.
Clear up the chaos in your MSP and create a well-organized environment that will increase your revenue and customer satisfaction.
All it takes is hiring a dispatcher!
Want one? We have many great dispatchers that we have contracted out to MSPs, as well as many more who could be right for you as a dedicated team member! So feel free to contact us for more information on how to see our candidates.
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