Professional solution to IT service processes
Previously, Teknosa staff members working in various cities around Turkey used to communicate their demands to the center through e-mails or telephone calls.
With the increasing number of e-mails, Teknosa IT department started to experience problems, therefore Teknosa IT director Önder Kaplancık began working on a new solution: "As the number of employees and the stores increased, the service demands reaching the IT department also increased. After a while, the number of e-mails reached 6000 per month. To meet such high demand levels, we needed a more professional software package. Moreover, we were unable to effectively measure and report the incoming demands. When we could not accomplish reporting, we could not produce long term solutions to problems. Therefore, after conducting some research we decided to purchase a professional application along with a solution partner."
HP Service Manager
For the IT infrastructure in the institution to function properly, the IT departments needed to establish a series of operational rules and adhere to them. With ITIL processes providing a general framework and best practice examples in this area, it is possible to organize the IT services within an institution in a much better fashion. Önder Kaplancık explains the transformation process: "After considering a few different solution options, we have adopted the HP Service Manager infrastructure because it was a system already applied and proven around the world. We immediately received the ITIL training and started the application procedure. We finished the project design and soon afterwards our employees started to process their service demands through Help Desk. Their demands, which had reached a monthly figure of 6000 through e-mail, reduced by half during the first month and this number continued to drop in the following months."
Long term solutions
Önder Kaplancık explains that previously, the complaints received through e-mail could not be recorded thus causing delays in finding common solutions. He adds that with the new system the workload of the IT department decreased and they can now meet the demands much faster: "One of the most important benefits of the system has been the ability to categorize the complaints. For example, when there were many complaints about the rebate cheques, we could see that there was a problem in that area. When we solved the general problem in this area, there was automatically a marked decrease in the related calls. By being able to categorize the complaints, the problems could be solved in a much faster way and it became easier to understand the causes of the problems."
Critical and priority problems
In addition, the Help Desk application has also made it possible to solve critical problems faster. Kaplancık says that it has become easier to determine whether problems are critical or not through the Help Desk. Therefore, it became easier for them to prioritize. He also adds that they can establish the rules themselves now: "Previously, the person entering the problem determined whether it was critical or not. Now the system automatically sets this according to the question type and its category. Thanks to this important feature, the critical problems are solved earlier and the solution period is much shorter."
All the demands in one system
The Help Desk is currently not applied solely for the IT services of Teknosa, it is applied for all the service demands within the institution. The employees now use this common system for all their service demands. In this way, all employee demands, from the communication of a malfunctioning product to a broken window replacement, are provided through the HP Service Manager infrastructure.
Kaplancık adds: "Our 3000 employees spread all around Turkey used to communicate their service needs to us through e-mail and the number of these e-mails went as high as 6000 a month. With the Help Desk application, we moved on from the e-mail era and became able to meet demands faster. Previously, we had been late in finding common solutions to similar problems because we could not report the incoming complaints. Now, the workload of the IT department has decreased and we can meet the demands much faster."