Managing Cases

This chapter provides overviews of the configurable case, case access, and case management and discusses how to:

• Search for existing cases.

• Manage basic case information.

• Validate errors reported by callers.

• Integrate with third-party asset management applications.

See Also

Processing Cases

Understanding the Configurable Case

In PeopleSoft CRM one Case component supports all PeopleSoft CRM Support, HelpDesk, HelpDesk for Human Resources, and Service Center for Higher Education applications, as well as the related industry solutions.

The system stores the display template family code within the Case component. The display template family code identifies the type of the Case and may provide several display template IDs that a user can choose from.

Display template IDs control the appearance and behavior of the Case component and its pages to support the varied business needs of call centers. An implementer can choose to show or hide pages, sections, and fields. An implementer can also control field labels.

Understanding Case Access

This section discusses:

• Case creation.

• Case retrieval.

• Saved searches.

See Also

Working with Multichannel Applications

Configuring Multichannel Applications

Accessing the 360-Degree View

Managing Related Cases

Defining Call Center Business Units

Case Creation

You can create new cases in several ways:

• Navigate to your PeopleSoft call center application (Support, HelpDesk, HR HelpDesk, or Analyst Service Center) and select Add Case.

  When users want to add new cases, they are taken directly to the Case component in Add mode. Users can search for customers or employees directly on the Case page, thus increasing efficiency and usability. Users can also enter information about the case before identifying the customer.

  As delivered, the Analyst Service Center provides creation and retrieval of three different types of case (each based on a separate Display Template ID). These cases are tailored for Information Technology (IT)-related cases, non-IT (support) cases, and blended cases (which may be used to track either IT or non-IT cases).

  Note. You can also use the Support Center, Help Desk Center, or HR Help Desk Center links from the Home page to navigate through the applications and add new cases.

• Use Quick Create functionality.

  Use the Quick Create function to provide service quickly to create new customers, consumers, contacts, and workers.

• Use a computer telephony integration (CTI) system to identify a caller.

  The CTI system enters caller information on the 360-Degree View page. From there, you can access the Case page to create a new case. The system populates customer or contact information on this page from the 360-Degree View page.

  Note. An agent may also use the 360-Degree View page without CTI to gather information about the customer before entering a new case.

• Clone an existing case by clicking the Clone Case button on the case toolbar.

  Use this method when the new case is substantially similar to another case.

• Create a new case from the Related Cases page of an existing case.

  Use this method when the new case is related to an existing case. This method enables you to establish the relationship between the cases at the same time that you create the new case.

  Using this method, you can select the type of information to copy to the new case. If you do not copy caller information, you can identify the caller using the appropriate fields on the new Case page.

• If an implementer enables the Agent - My Cases pagelet, agents can create cases without leaving their personal case access portal.

• In the email workspace, agents can make use of email handling options to create and associate a case to an email to support the completion of the correspondence.

• If an implementer enables the configuration option for a group worklist to create cases for new inbound email, the system creates a case for each incoming unstructured email that ERMS receives and routes to that group worklist.

  See Defining Group Worklists.

Note. To generate a case ID before a case is saved, implementers and administrators can select the Case ID Before Save check box on the Call Center Definition - Options page. This feature is useful if you want to provide customers with a case ID before the agent enters all the problem information. Note that if the agent provides the customer with a case ID for their reference and the agent tries to save a case and is not able to, the customer has a case ID that is not recorded in the system.

Default Contact Information

When you create a new case, the system enters default contact information for the caller.

For PeopleSoft Support, when a user selects both the customer and contact, the contact information is obtained from the contact's preferred primary phone and email information.

For PeopleSoft HelpDesk and HelpDesk for Human Resources, a user selects an employee rather than a customer and contact. They can also enter an alternative contact in addition to an employee. In this case, the contact information comes from the alternative contact instead of the employee.

For PeopleSoft Service Center for Higher Education, user may select an individual consumer (a category which includes individual students), a company and contact, or an employee (staff or faculty member).

Case Retrieval

Access an existing case directly from your My Cases pagelet or use the Case Search page. You can perform a search based on case information (such as the case number) or caller information.

If you know the case number, you do not have to identify the business unit before searching. If you are searching based on other criteria, enter a business unit before performing the search.

Note. The number and type of information fields on the Case Search page that are used to search for cases is determined in the Configurable Search Definition, which is associated to the Display Template.

See Configuring Display Templates, Configuring Search Pages.

If you use CTI to access the Case page, the system normally bypasses the Case Search page because the CTI system provides the data that would otherwise be found through the search mechanism. However, if a caller provides an invalid case number, the system cannot go directly to the Case page. Instead, it displays the Case Search page and enters the data that is provided by CTI into the search fields. Because the appearance of the Case Search page indicates that the case number is invalid, you must delete the invalid case number before performing a search.

Note. When a case is secure, only agents in the assigned provider group are authorized to open the case. If you use CTI or the 360-Degree View page to access the Case page and the system tries to send the case to an agent who is not authorized, the agent receives a message stating that he or she is not authorized to open the case. To avoid this situation, consider the secure case scenario when you configure your routing rules.

See Also

Understanding Call Center Business Units

Configuring CTI

Using PeopleSoft Support Pagelets

Saved Searches

Saved searches enable you to reuse case search criteria. The system saves searches under your user ID by maintaining separate lists of saved searches for each user.

The behavior of the saved search depends on how the search page was set up on the Configurable Search Setup page. The system administrator can choose to populate the results grid automatically with the most recently used search criteria or with the user's default saved search. If the administrator selects the check box that enables users to choose how the results grid is initialized, then users have the option to:

• Save search criteria.

• Personalize available search fields.

• Decide how the results grid is initialized.

See Also

BO Searches on Configurable Search Pages

Understanding Case Management

This section discusses:

• Case page activities.

• Quick codes.

• Case information security.

• Case assignments.

• Case visibility

• Case closure.

• Case toolbar functions.

• Toolbar functions.

• Background processing.

Note. This chapter discusses Case page activities. Subsequent chapters discuss additional case processing that take place on other pages in the Case component.

Case Page Activities

Depending on the display template, the Case page can be divided into the following sections:

Note. Sections marked with an asterisk (*) are delivered enabled when you first install the application. The display template controls the visibility of the other sections.

• Partner information section (not available for PeopleSoft HelpDesk applications).

• Customer information section. *

  This section is titled Employee Information for PeopleSoft HelpDesk applications.

• Academic Information section (associated only with PeopleSoft Service Center for Higher Education).

• Problem section. *

• Case Information section. *

• Actions section. *

• Add a note section.

• Incident address section.

• Dispute Information section (not available for PeopleSoft HelpDesk applications).

• Complaint Information section (not available for PeopleSoft HelpDesk applications).

  Note. The Dispute and Complaint sections are intended for the Financial Services (FSI) and Communications (COM) industries. You can display these sections, but they are not useful or fully functional unless you use the additional industry functionality.

See Processing Cases.

See Configuring Display Templates for Components.

Partner Information Section

The Partner section options appear on display templates only if PeopleSoft Enterprise Partner Relationship Management is installed. To display the options on the Case page, you must select the desired options from the Partner section. You can elect to display the options grouped in a section of the Case page or as separate fields (such as Partner and Partner Contact) on the Case Information section (Main sub-page) of the Case page.

If you have purchased PeopleSoft Enterprise PRM for Service, the display template contains the Partner section and field options, which are delivered disabled. You can select from two display layout options: on the Case Information section or as its own Partner section on the Case page.

Customer Information Section

In PeopleSoft Support, the case's Customer Information section contains customer fields. The same section for a PeopleSoft HelpDesk or HelpDesk for Human Resources case contains employee fields.

In Service Center for Higher Education, you can search for a company (and company contact), consumer, or worker. Note that students (constituents) have the role of consumer within the Service Center for Higher Education application, while staff and faculty have the role of worker. An individual with the role of company contact who also has the role of consumer or worker will show up multiple times in the search results (both as an individual and as a representative of the company). However, individuals who are not company contacts will show up only once in the search results, even if they have both the role of consumer and worker.

Consider the following when using the Customer Information section:

• If you are searching for a company, you can enter a partial value in the Company field and click the Search button.

  The system returns a list of companies that begin with the value you entered in the Company field. If only one company matches your search, the system displays a page with all of the contacts for that particular company. When creating a case for a company, you must identify a contact person. A contact person is optional if you are creating a case for a consumer.

• If you are searching for a consumer, you can enter a partial value in either the First Name or Last Name field and click the Search button.

  Do not enter anything in the Company field.

• If you want to edit a contact's contact method for the case, click the Edit link to launch the Edit Contact Information page.

  This page lists the contact information for the selected contact. The system lists only address information for HelpDesk for Human Resources cases.

• Business Object Search functionality controls the appearance of customer search fields and some of the other fields.

  Note. For PeopleSoft HelpDesk applications, the appearance of certain fields is controlled by the secure worker role.

  See Understanding BO Search and Quick Create Setup.

• If a case is created automatically by the system for an inbound email message (a feature that can be enabled in any group worklist definition with the installation of ERMS), the email sender (identified by the email address) is populated as the customer contact of the case.

  If the email address does not match any of the customer record in the CRM system, one of these two things happens based on the setup of the mailbox to which the inbound email is routed—either a new customer (a Person record) is created using the email address and becomes the contact of the case, or the Anonymous User person record is used as the customer (consumer) of the case. On the other hand, if multiple matches are found for the email address, the Select Sender link appears in the Customer Information section, indicating that the call center agent needs to choose an email sender as the case customer.

  A case customer must be identified before a case can be saved, unless the Anonymous Caller option is selected on the case.

  See Defining Group Worklists.

The Customer Information Section is grouped using an expandable group box layout. Use the display template to control how the fields appear in each section.

Note. If you select an incorrect company, you can search again to select the appropriate company. For PeopleSoft HelpDesk customers, one person can enter a case on behalf of another person. You can select the employee associated with the case, select an alternative contact, and then click the Edit button to enter contact details for the case.

See Configuring Display Templates for Components.

Academic Information Section

This section is enabled for cases in Service Center for Higher Education. It displays a summary of the academic information (such as institution, program and plan) that is associated with the constituent. The fields in this section are not editable (any required updates to the information should be processed in the PeopleSoft Campus Solutions application).

Because individuals may be linked to more than one institution, program, plan, or sub-plan, the information in this section is presented in a scroll area, so that multiple sets of information may be viewed.

Problem Information Section

This section discusses two fields: Summary and Description.

The Summary field is required. The system can be configured so that values for the Summary and Description fields can be entered by default on the Case page when the user selects a quick code. If a problem summary is already entered on an existing case, a quick code will not overwrite the Summary and Description fields unless the overwrite check box is selected for either the Summary or Description fields in the quick code. In this case, you can overwrite the values for the Summary and Description fields even if these fields are already populated.

Note. Call center agents can also use text trays and quick keys to automatically fill static and dynamic data into the Description field.

See Working with the Text Tray.

Case Information Section

The fields in the Case Information section are grouped using the configurable Embedded Tabs section layout. By default, the system displays the Main and More tabs. Use the display template to determine the number of tabs, their labels, and the fields that you want to appear.

This section discusses how to:

• Secure a case.

• Enable the creation of a case with an anonymous caller.

• Enable the creation of a case that specifies a site as the customer rather than a person or company.

  This capability is useful for service calls that must be specified by location rather than by a contact name or billing entity.

• Display the business unit associated with the case.

• Select a quick code.

  You can configure a quick code to populate other fields.

• Categorize a case.

  The Category, Specialty Type, and Detail fields can affect the way in which the system assigns provider groups and agents to the case.

• Assign a case.

  You can assign a case in many ways. You can configure the system to automatically suggest a provider group and agent.

• Associate and describe a product for which support is extended.

  You can record its placement within a product hierarchy, serial number, where it was purchased, and whether it is installed.

• Record asset information.

  You can track company equipment with identification numbers and track whether the equipment is installed.

• Track the reported problem.

  You can prioritize and categorize problems by type and severity, create and assign error codes and messages to attach to the problem, and record the response and outcome.

• Perform an entitlement search.

  PeopleSoft call center applications enable you to set up agreements and warranties that govern and track a customer's or an employee's entitlement to support. To control the way the system searches for agreements, you can use the configuration options available on the Agreement Search Configuration page. You can also use the Active Analytics Framework (AAF) to set up automatic agreement searches.

  See Setting Up and Managing Agreements and Warranties.

• Authorize a credit card.

• Review response times.

  You can view the service-level agreement information about expected and actual response and restore times. A customer's entitled response and restore time takes a business's hours of operation into consideration. The system uses the same logic for holiday schedules. If an agreement is entitled with regular hours of operation but the business is closed on public holidays, the entitlement takes the holiday schedule into account. On the Service Level page, you can use the Holiday Schedule field to select the holiday schedule that you want associated with the service level. The system provides the holiday schedule by default to the agreement line when the service level is specified.

• Review survey scores.

  If you have permission to view the Survey Score field, you can review the scores generated by the surveys that were sent to customers by email. You can also review the actual survey by clicking a link on the Related Actions page in the Case component after the customer has filled out the survey. This field, however, does not appear on the page unless you enable it on the Display Template - Page Definition page. You must also sign in as a user with permission to view this field; otherwise, it does not appear on the page. You can set up your system so that an agent can send a survey manually to a customer's email address, or you can use AAF to automatically send surveys to customers when agents close cases. To run and view reports that show survey scores for particular agents or types of cases, refer to the documentation for your PeopleSoft Enterprise CRM 9.1 Online Marketing application.

Actions Section

The link categories that you or your implementation team set up during installation appear in the Actions section on the main Case and Summary pages. You can link to pages such as those in the Human Resources database (used in HelpDesk for Human Resources) or the PeopleSoft Campus Solutions application (used in PeopleSoft Service Center for Higher Education), or you can link to related actions, business projects, change requests, and so on.

Using AAF policies or by selecting a quick code, you can configure your system to automatically suggest an action. You also can manually select an action from the Actions section.

Only those link categories and definitions that are associated to a link group—which is associated to a display template—appear in the Actions section.

See Viewing and Modifying Link Groups.

Add a Note Section

The Add a Note section, which is delivered as hidden, provides a note field on the main Case page. Each time users open a particular case, they can only add one note on the Case page. Once a note has been added on the Case page, it may be edited there, if desired, until the user exits the case. However, to add additional notes without exiting and re-opening the case, the user must use the Notes page. On the Notes page, agents can always add new notes, as well as view and edit existing notes.

Note. To create a note using text tray functionality, you need to be on the Notes page.

See Adding Notes and Attachments.

Incident Address Section

This section is delivered hidden. If you want to make the Incident Address section visible, modify the display template to enable this section.

In the Incident Address group box, you record information about the location of the incident.

In this group box, you can:

• Enter either a street address or the intersection for the incident.

  If the system is integrated with Environmental Systems Research Institute (ESRI) software to generate maps, the address must include at least the Address 1 field and the zip code. Location by intersection requires two cross streets.

• Describe additional information about the location using free-form text.

Dispute Information

If you purchased the PeopleSoft CRM Communications solution, you can enable the display of information, fields, and action links specific to the recording of complaint calls concerning telecommunications services.

The dispute information section offers a selection of fields and details specific to handling billing disputes, including:

• Bill date and period.

• Adjustment type and amount.

• Reason for the dispute.

• Communications-specific case search definition.

Actions include these industry-specific action links:

• Business Project

• Create RMA (return materials agreements)

• Defect - Create New

• Defect - Relate

• Sales Lead

• Sales Order

• Service Order

Note. Some of the information in this section is related to Actions and the Case Search functionality, which is part of the overall communications industry solution. Information in this section is not necessarily related to the Dispute functionality.

When enabled, the Dispute Information section appears when the Case Type is Bill Dispute, which is an option available only in the telecommunications solution.

To activate this functionality you must select the Dispute Information check box on the Display Template - Page Definition page.

Note. To dispute a bill and open a new case, you must first access the Account - Balance page within the Customer Accounts component and click the Dispute Balance button associated with the item you are disputing. Clicking the Dispute Balance button opens a new case for the customer and makes the case type a read-only field with the value equal to Dispute. You cannot manually select Dispute as the case type on the Case page.

Complaint Information

Although not exclusive of all other call center applications, the Complaint Information section is designed for support response in the insurance and financial services environment. Features of the Complaint Information section include:

• The Complaint Details section offers this selection of specific fields and details:

  • A description of the cause.

  • Reimbursement information.

  • Communications records.

  • Personnel involved.

  • Check boxes for follow-up actions.

• An industry-specific case search definition.

• A set of action links for insurance and financial product support.

  Action links are Business Project and Sales Lead. The suggested action is Create Workflow.

  Note. Some of the information in this section is related to the overall solution for the Financial Services and Insurance industries. It is not necessarily related to the Complaint functionality.

To specify the display of complaint information, select Complaint for the Case Type on the Case page. Make sure, however, that the Complaint Details section is enabled on the Display Template - Page Definition page.

Note. The system displays the Complaint Information section on the Case page only when the user has selected the section on the display template and selected Complaint as the Case Type on the Case page. For support cases, when a user selects Complaint as the Case Type but the section is hidden on the display template, the system does not display the Complaint Information section on the Case page, and it does not save any complaint information to the database.

Note. Two case type fields can be enabled through the display template. One enables a server trip and one does not. It is recommended that you enable the one with the server trip if you are using the Complaint or Dispute sections in your application. Enabling the field with the server trip exposes certain sections and fields on the Case page that you can fill out; these sections and fields are related to a complaint or dispute.

To enable the Case Type field to make a server trip when it is selected, go to Set Up CRM, Common Definitions, Component Configuration, Display Templates, Display Template Details, Case, Show Section Details. In the CASE_INFO section, select Case Type - Non deferred (RC_CASETYPE_NONDEF).

See Also

Basic Link Setup

Quick Codes

You can use quick codes to populate these fields on the Case page:

• Note (Summary and Description)

• Problem (Summary and Description)

• Case Status

• Case Priority

• Case Impact

• Urgency

• Case Severity

• Provider Group

• Assigned To

• Case Type

• Case Subtype

• Category

• Specialty Type

• Detail

• Error Code

• Error Message

• Interested Parties

• Product ID

• Product Group

• Suggested Action (Link Category, Version, Link Name)

• Solution and solution status

Case Information Security

You can control the visibility of the Secured check box by using a display template. When an agent determines that a case is sensitive, he or she can select the Secured check box in the Case Information section of the template to specify that the case should be viewed only by individuals associated with the provider group on the case.

When a case is marked secured, the agent must specify a provider group before saving the case. Once the agent secures the case, it is associated with the provider group. Only agents belonging to the provider group can access the case. If the agent who created the case is not a member of the provider group, the agent cannot access the secured case.

Note. Security is implemented on specific pages throughout the system. If your organization modifies the system to show case summary information on additional pages, you must secure the information appropriately.

The word Secured is substituted for the case summary on the following pages:

• Case Search.

  Secured appears in the Problem Summary field of the search results grid both when accessing a case and when searching for a case to relate to another case.

  Note. The other fields in the search results grid display actual case data; therefore, agents can view the case status or the assigned agent without accessing the case. This limited visibility enables even non-authorized agents to provide limited support when callers inquire about a secure case. The link to access the case, however, is disabled for unauthorized users.

• 360-Degree View for authorized and unauthorized cases.

  The 360-Degree View page for PeopleSoft HelpDesk for Human Resources and the Constituent 360-Degree View page for Service Center for Higher Education each have two case nodes, one for cases that cannot be accessed (unauthorized) and one for those that can (authorized).

  Secured appears if the Case node in the action tree is configured to show the case summary. You can also configure the unauthorized node to show the summary of the secured case. The 360-Degree View page for PeopleSoft HelpDesk for Human Resources and for Service Center for Higher Education is delivered showing only the case status and count. For 360-Degree Views that are not related to these two applications, secure cases are not hidden or disabled on these pages or sections.

• Related Cases.

• Solution - Related Actions.

• Solution pages.

  Secured appears in the search results grid.

• Worklist.

  Secured appears if the agent is not in the provider group.

• Email notifications (automated and manual).

  The PeopleSoft system does not prohibit users from emailing case information to other users who don't have access to the case (for example, through the Outbound Notification page). The summary does not change for email notifications about secured cases.

Note. When an agent prompts for cases, the system displays only those cases that the agent is authorized to access. To access a secured case, the agent must be a member of the provider group associated with the case.

Configuration Issues for Secured Cases

To avoid sending out information about secured cases when you are setting up AAF policies, business projects, workflow actions, and email templates, use the Secured Case field (SECURE_CASE_FLG) on the Case page (RC_CASE) to define record field conditions.

For example, suppose you want to suppress secured cases from being viewed by unauthorized users. You can define an event to perform a check for a value equal to N on the SECURE_CASE_FLG field before displaying or distributing case information.

Note. Secured case functionality can be used by any call center application. However, this functionality is delivered only for PeopleSoft HelpDesk for Human Resources. The secure case flag is part of a condition to make sure you don't send out secure information. AAF policies do not automatically treat secured cases as special.

Case Assignments

You can assign a case to any worker except future-dated workers. The worker to whom a case is assigned is the case owner, even if other agents or specialists are helping the assignee.

You can also assign cases to provider groups rather than to individual agents. Provider groups are pools of agents with something in common, like agents who support a certain product or work at a particular call center.

You can assign cases by:

• Entering the provider group or agent name manually.

• Invoking the assignment engine, which suggests an assignee.

  The assignment engine attempts to match the person or provider group with all of the competencies associated with the case category, type, or detail, whichever level is appropriate for the case.

  Additionally, because you can associate competencies with problem types, the assignment engine attempts to match the person or provider group with the competencies listed for the problem.

  You can set up the assignment engine to assign cases to provider groups according to the competencies associated with problem types and then to assign cases to agents according to the competencies associated with category, type, and detail.

  See Setting Up and Performing Assignment Searches.

  Note. Based on how you configure the system, the assignment engine will also uses product, customer, region, and location information.

• Entering a quick code.

  You can enter a quick code that is associated with a default assignee (either a provider group or an agent).

• Having the system assign the case at save time.

  Auto-assignment options that are configured in the Call Center Business Unit component occur only if you have not already assigned the case. If you use AAF policies to assign the case, the event definitions determine the conditions under which the assignment occurs.

Assignment Notifications

The PeopleSoft system delivers call center workflow to send notifications when a case is assigned or reassigned.

If you assign cases to provider groups (without specifying an agent within the group), you can use AAF policies to send an assignment notification to the provider group's worklist. Usually, the worklist monitor assigns the worklist item, the case, or both to an individual. The PeopleSoft system is not delivered with this workflow turned on, however. To use this functionality, you must reset the end date in the AAF policy.

See Also

Defining Call Center Business Units

Understanding Provider Groups and Group Members

Setting Up and Performing Assignment Searches

Working with Active Analytics Framework

Case Visibility

To prevent employees from viewing sensitive case information (for example, grievances) through the HelpDesk self-service applications, the PeopleSoft system includes a value called Internal, exclude Case Contact in the Visibility drop-down list box on the main Case page.

When a user selects Internal, exclude Case Contact, the employee who is the subject of the case is unable to view the case through the HelpDesk self-service application.

The person who reported the case (Reported By) can view it in the self-service application if the case is not secured. When a case is secured, the Reported By person will no longer be able to view the case in the self-service application.

When an agent selects the Internal, exclude Case Contact visibility value and clicks the Notification button, the system displays a warning message to the agent that the employee does not have visibility to this case. In this situation, you would not want to send a notification to the employee.

The system does not display the employee name and email address in the Recipients grid on the Outbound Notification page.

The Case Contact role query has been modified so that it won’t return the case contact when the agent selects the Internal, exclude Case Contact visibility value. This modification prevents the agent from sending a notification to the employee in question.

To update a secured case when the visibility is Internal, exclude Case Contact, the PeopleSoft system has a new policy called Case Visibility Changed.

When a case is secured, an agent that does not belong to the provider group can’t open the case. This safeguard prevents the agent from opening the case from the 360-Degree View page and discussing it with the employee in question.

Note. This feature is only applicable to PeopleSoft HelpDesk and HelpDesk for Human Resources.

Case Closure

The Case Status field on the Case page shows where the case is in its life cycle. You close a case by selecting the appropriate status in the Case Status field.

Case status values vary by implementation, but all case statuses fall into one of these categories:

• Open

• Closed

• On Hold

• Canceled

These processing rules are based on the case status categories:

• Your business unit settings determine whether you can reopen canceled or closed cases.

  You can also set up the Call Center Definition - Case Defaults page to change the status automatically when an agent obtains a successful resolution.

  See Defining Call Center Business Units and Display Template Options.

• When you close a case, the current date and time are entered in the Closed Date field; if you reopen the case, the Closed Date field is cleared.

• If a case is associated with a solvable action, you can close the case by selecting the action.

• You cannot close a case until it has either a resolution associated with it or a solvable action associated with it.

  You can set up your system to prevent the closing of cases unless there is a business project associated with the case. To do this, however, the business project related action must be marked as solvable on the Link Definition page. If the business project is marked as solvable and it is associated with the case, the business project doesn't need to be closed before you can close the case.

• You can set up the system at the business unit level to allow cases to be resolved after sending outbound notifications from them.

  When this option is selected, the Send and Solve toolbar button appears on the Outbound Notification page. When the user finishes composing the message and clicks the button, the system sends the notification out to recipients and solves the associated case transaction by setting its status to the predefined resolved case status (for example, Closed - Resolved).

  If the outbound notification requires approval from a supervisor, the system resolves the associated case upon receipt of the approval from the supervisor.

  See Defining Business Rules for a Call Center Business Unit.

When cascading statuses through related cases, these rules also apply:

• Changing the parent case's status changes the status of all child cases unless:

  • The child case is associated with an open case.

  • The child case is in a closed or canceled status that is not the same as the parent's original status.

• You can close a case using more than one resolution.

• Closing a parent case cascades the successful solution to the child cases that are associated with the parent case.

• Reopening a parent case changes the successful solutions in the child cases to failed solutions.

• When a case is closed, it becomes read-only except for the Case Notes and Resolution Status fields.

  This flexibility accommodates instances for which multiple resolutions can close a case for that business unit.

  Note. A solvable action will not cascade to the other cases, but a successful resolution will.

See Also

Defining Call Center Business Units and Display Template Options

Understanding Case, Service Order, and Defect Resolution

Performing Entitlement Searches for Cases and Service Orders

Case Toolbar Functions

The toolbar at the top of all of the pages in the Case component provides access to several common activities. The toolbar is configurable; these activities are available only if the toolbar is active.

See Configuring Toolbars.

The PeopleSoft system delivers configurable toolbar definitions, one for each application.

Common Call Center Toolbar Buttons

The configurable toolbar in all call center applications contains these buttons:

• Print

• Spell Check

• 360-Degree View

• 360-Degree Search

• Text Tray

• Notification

• Email

• Time Entry

• Search

• Next

• Add

• Update

• Clone Case

• Correspondence

Additional Toolbar Buttons for PeopleSoft Support

In addition to the common buttons, the toolbar for PeopleSoft Support contains these buttons:

• Upsell

• Order

• Map Dashboard

• CTI Dialout

  If customers implement their own CTI switch, they need to implement a new Javascript function that is specific to the CTI switch. PeopleSoft CRM delivers a Javascript function that works with the delivered CTI definitions, so when an agent clicks the button, an outbound call is made for the phone number listed on the case. If customers have a specific CTI switch implementation, they must add a new Javascript function for the implementation (the Javascript function file should be located in the <PS_HOME>/cs/ps/pCti directory) and register it in the CTI component of the CRM system.

  See Setting Up CTI System Definitions.

• Get Offer/Promotions

Note. You must use PeopleSoft's AAF functionality to activate the Get Offer/Promotions button; this functionality is not delivered. When AAF policy conditions are met, the existing Upsell Configuration on Case action displays the Get Offers icon on the Case toolbar. This action is modifiable to present the Get Offers/Promotions button based on rules that are evaluated by the existence of a third-party optimization engine. Agents can also initiate branch or advisor scripts associated with the offer for scripted selling.

See Working with Active Analytics Framework.

See Setting Up Links and Related Actions.

Additional Toolbar Buttons for PeopleSoft HelpDesk

In addition to the common buttons, the toolbar for PeopleSoft HelpDesk contains these buttons:

• Asset Discovery

  Provided that system and data integration has been accomplished, this button launches an asset management application, which passes the desired asset information to the application for reporting.

  You can also launch asset discoveries from the:

  • 360-degree view of an employee.

  • Case toolbar.

• Remote Control

  The Remote Control button launches a third-party remote control process that enables an IT agent to:

  • Remotely query for data from an installed product or asset.

  • Run a process to remotely take control of an employee’s computer to resolve a problem.

See Integrating with Third-Party Asset Management Applications.

Additional Toolbar Buttons for PeopleSoft Service Center for Higher Education

In addition to the common buttons, the toolbar for PeopleSoft Service Center for Higher Education may contain these buttons (depending on whether the user has accessed an IT, non-IT, or blended case):

• Upsell Opportunity Alert

• Order

• Map Dashboard

• CTI Dialout

  If customers implement their own CTI switch, they need to implement a new Javascript function that is specific to the CTI switch. PeopleSoft CRM delivers a Javascript function that works with the delivered CTI definitions, so when an agent clicks the button, an outbound call is made for the phone number listed on the case. If customers have a specific CTI switch implementation, they must add a new Javascript function for the implementation (the Javascript function file should be located in the <PS_HOME>/cs/ps/pCti directory) and register it in the CTI component of the CRM system.

  See Setting Up CTI System Definitions.

• Asset Summary

• Remote Control

  The Remote Control button launches a third-party remote control process that enables an IT agent to:

  • Remotely query for data from an installed product or asset.

  • Run a process to remotely take control of an employee’s computer to resolve a problem.

Notifications

The Notification toolbar button provides convenient access to case-related communication and worklist tasks. Clicking this button:

• Launches the Outbound Notification page for users to compose and send email and worklist notifications.

• Launches the email workspace for users to respond to existing email messages that are associated with the case. Email workspace can be used for sending new adhoc emails based on system setup.

  This function is available with the installation of Multichannel Communications.

Time Tracking

When you create a new case, the system creates a time record for the case. For the system to do this, you must first set up autonumbering for time records.

Important! Because the system creates a time record for every case, you must set up autonumbering for time records even if you don't track the time that you spend working on cases.

To track the time that you spend working on a case, click the Track Time button in the case toolbar to access the Manage Time page.

Use the Manage Time page to record the start and end times for each block of time that you work on the case. Unless the case is resolved during the first call, separate time records will exist for the different blocks of time spent working on the case. Every person who works on a case needs to record time separately.

The time entry record is created the first time that the case is saved in the agent-facing component. For cases created elsewhere (for example, cases created in self-service, through cloning, or through related case functionality), the system does not create the time record until the case is accessed and saved in the agent-facing component. If a user clicks the Track Time button for a case that does not yet have a time record, the system prompts the user to save the case first.

When you add a new row to the time record, the system enters the name of the currently assigned agent to that row. If your name does not appear as the currently assigned agent, change this value to your own name.

The system enters the current date and time as the start time. These default values are helpful for agents who create the time record when they start working on a case and then return to the time record later to enter the end time. If you create the record at the end of a block of time when you've worked on the case, you must override the default start time.

Note. If an existing case has time recorded, and an agent subsequently changes the Business Unit on the case, the existing time entries will be updated to the new Business Unit.

Upsell Opportunities

This functionality is available only in PeopleSoft Support and PeopleSoft Service Center for Higher Education.

If a caller reports a problem with an old or superseded product, you might want to recommend that the caller upgrade to a newer product. A flashing button, which appears on the toolbar on the Case page, alerts agents to a potential upsell opportunity.

The flashing button is triggered based on conditions set up in an AAF policy. For example, you can trigger the upsell toolbar button to flash when a customer is identified or when a product is selected and the case has a specified priority.

If you have installed PeopleSoft Enterprise Advisor, it is used to recommend a product to upsell. If Advisor is not installed, a branch script is used. Branch scripts are associated with specific products. Clicking the button launches either Advisor or a branch script and adds it to the list of related actions for the case.

Note. You can also control how the toolbar buttons behave using AAF policies.

See Configuring Case Upsell Actions.

See Working with Active Analytics Framework.

From the Actions section on the Case page or from the Related Actions page, you can transfer directly to the Order Capture page. Whenever possible, the system maps branch script answers to corresponding fields on the Order Capture page. This mapping is accomplished using variables associated with the branch script. For example, the system maps the Product field (if it appears) to the Order Capture page.

Text Trays

Call center agents can use text trays and quick keys to auto-fill static and dynamic data, reply to emails, create text for ad hoc notifications or emails, or create notes about a case.

You can use both public and personal quick keys in text tray-enabled text fields within transaction pages. You can also create and maintain your own set of personal quick keys.

Administrators and implementers can manage and create public quick keys. They can create two types of quick keys:

• Dynamic quick keys are comprised of static text and a dynamic token, which pulls the value from the database.

• Static quick key always resolve to straight text.

You can create quick key categories and edit existing and delivered categories, edit existing quick keys, group quick keys into categories, and determine the key sequence for hot keys.

You can use the Quick Code functionality to auto-populate these fields in PeopleSoft Support, HelpDesk, and HelpDesk for Human Resources:

• Problem - Description field on the Case page.

• Details field on the Notes page.

For example, you can have a quick code that automatically fills out the case and inserts text into the Problem - Description field. Included in this text could be the #123 quick key code, which would resolve to text through the Text Tray functionality.

See Setting Up Quick Codes.

See Working with the Text Tray.

Toolbar Functions

Access the Case page in PeopleSoft Support, HelpDesk, HelpDesk for Human Resources, or Service Center for Higher Education. The toolbar at the top of the Case page and all pages in the Case component include a row with buttons and a time zone control.

The toolbar configuration controls which buttons appear. As delivered, the button row in the toolbar displays some or all page elements. Page elements that are common across all applications are documented in the PeopleSoft Enterprise CRM 9.1 Automation and Configuration Tools PeopleBook.

See Configuring Toolbars.

See Also

Reviewing Case History

Sending Manual Notifications

Configuring Toolbars

Background Processing

This section discusses case processing that is transparent to the end user.

Active Analytics Framework (AAF)

PeopleSoft AAF is a suite of tools comprising a closed-loop decision-making system where you can address specific business issues. Applications can respond when certain conditions are met and certain actions are recommended.

Actions include giving a priority service or a better discount for high-value customers, identifying fraudulent transactions, and displaying alerts and warning messages.

At runtime, applications send requests to the AAF decision engine to evaluate all of the policies pertaining to a trigger point. For policies whose conditions are evaluated as true, the system invokes their associated actions.

Your organization can set up AAF policies to trigger various actions under specified conditions. The AAF decision engine can perform several actions that are transparent to the person who triggers the action.

AAF policies can:

• Send general-purpose notifications.

• Send notifications related to entitlements.

  Agreement lines provide customers with specific entitlements such as guaranteed response times and recovery times. Each entitlement can be associated with a workflow rule that sends a notification at a predetermined time. Typically, the notification informs you of an impending deadline.

• Track consumption of prepaid cases under an agreement line that covers a specific number of prepaid cases (PeopleSoft Support only).

• Cascade the case status and resolution information to child cases.

• Send notifications to agents and managers when a case is escalated.

  When a user clicks the Escalate Case button on the Case page, the system displays a message. If the user clicks OK, the system saves the case and sets off one of these trigger points in AAF: When a Support Case is Escalated or When a Help Desk Case is Escalated.

The AAF decision engine also triggers these actions, whose effects are visible in the case where they are triggered:

• Suggest an action.

• Display alert messages as well as cross-sell and upsell notifications.

• Recommend a solution or a product in an upsell or cross-sell situation.

• Log entries in the Events tab of the Case History page.

• Log entries in the Events tab of the Product History page of an installed product, service, or asset.

• Log entries in the Events tab of the Change Request History page.

• Instantiate a business project.

• Update information on a Case page.

• Display a new page from a link (not available for self-service cases.)

• Display the Upsell button in the toolbar.

• Set the display template ID.

See Working with Active Analytics Framework.

Interactions

Interactions are records of communication between you and your customers. Interactions can be related to transactional objects such as cases, service orders, and so on. Related transactions are considered subinteractions.

You don't need to set up workflow to capture interactions. The system captures them automatically based on certain actions that you perform.

The system records inbound interactions for a case when:

• You create or access a case from the 360-Degree View page.

• You create or access a case through the CTI system.

• A customer or employee uses self-service pages to access, update, or add a case.

The system records outbound interactions for a case when:

• You create correspondence for a case.

  Note. When an agent sends an email from a case to an employee, the system creates an interaction only if the employee is the customer, contact, or alternate contact for the case.

• You create notifications for a case.

See Also

Understanding AAF

Searching for Existing Cases

This section discusses:

• General information on searching for existing cases.

• Basic and advanced searches.

• Searches.

• Search criteria for PeopleSoft Support, HelpDesk, HelpDesk for Human Resources, and Service Center for Higher Education.

• Search criteria for PeopleSoft Support only.

• Search Criteria specific to PeopleSoft Support and Service Center for Higher Education

• Search criteria specific to PeopleSoft HelpDesk and HelpDesk for Human Resources.

• Search criteria specific to PeopleSoft HelpDesk, HelpDesk for Human Resources, and Service Center for Higher Education

• Search criteria specific to PeopleSoft HelpDesk for Human Resources.

• Search criteria specific to PeopleSoft Service Center for Higher Education

• Search commands.

• Search results.

• Search strategies.

General Information on Searching for Existing Cases

If the case is secured, the message Secured appears instead of the problem summary. This message comes from the message catalog, so that you can easily modify the text.

If you are using the Secure Case functionality, you must first establish a person ID on the User Profiles – ID page (select PeopleTools, Security, User Profiles, User Profiles, ID) for each user and then associate the person ID with an employee ID in the Worker component (select Workforce, Worker, Add Worker). The system uses the person ID to determine whether the user is in the provider group assigned to a secure case. If a user does not have a person ID when they try to access a case, the system displays an error message.

Most search criteria fields correspond to fields on the Case page. However, on the Case page, you must enter valid values, whereas on the Case Search page, you can enter part of the whole value in most fields (depending on what operators are set for a given search field).

Note. The information that is available for searching on the Case Search page is conditional, based on the template that you or your implementation team have assigned to the business unit.

There are a few exceptions:

• You must enter a complete value in these fields: Case (case number), Business Unit, and National ID (PeopleSoft HelpDesk for Human Resources only).

• You can enter partial values in the Customer and Contact fields, but only after you click the Lookup button associated with the field. The system displays the appropriate lookup page, where you can search for and select a customer or contact before attempting the search again.

  Note. If the operator is set to equal (=) then the entry must be an exact match. This is configurable through the Configurable Search Setup pages.

  See Configuring Search Pages.

Basic and Advanced Searches

You can use the basic search to perform searches using the most commonly used search fields. Advanced search provides users with a list of less commonly used search fields in addition to the more commonly used search fields available in basic search.

Users can perform Boolean searches using field-level search criteria. The system administrator defines the operators that appear on the Configurable Search Setup page. Users can further refine the list of operators for each field if they are granted permission to personalize their search settings.

The system displays a list of the searchable fields. For each field, you can enter a search operator and the search text.

Note. PeopleSoft does not deliver the contains operator because it may cause performance problems. To add it to the list of available operators, use the Configurable Search Setup pages.

See Configuring Searches.

Searches

Depending on how your implementation team configures the search pages for your system, you may not be able to view all of the fields listed below.

Note. If you do not see a field for which you want to perform a search on the basic search page, click the Advanced Search link. If the field that you are looking for does not appear, click the Personalize Search link. The system displays the Personalize Search Settings page (if the system administrator has made this page available to you). You can use this page to select additional fields to display on the search page. If you still do not see the field that you are looking for, contact your system administrator.

Note. In the sections that follow, not all available search fields are listed: some self-explanatory search fields are not explicitly described .

Search Criteria for PeopleSoft Support, HelpDesk, HelpDesk for Human Resources, and Service Center for Higher Education

The following search fields apply to PeopleSoft Support, HelpDesk, HelpDesk for Human Resources, and Service Center for Higher Education:

Search Criteria for PeopleSoft Support Only

This field is specific to PeopleSoft Support:

Search Criteria for PeopleSoft Support and Service Center for Higher Education

These fields are specific to PeopleSoft Support:

Search Criteria Specific to PeopleSoft HelpDesk and HelpDesk for Human Resources

This field is specific to PeopleSoft HelpDesk, and HelpDesk for Human Resources:

Search Criteria Specific to PeopleSoft HelpDesk, HelpDesk for Human Resources, and Service Center For Higher Education

These fields are specific to PeopleSoft HelpDesk, HelpDesk for Human Resources and Service Center for Higher Education:

Search Criteria Specific to PeopleSoft HelpDesk for Human Resources

This field is specific to PeopleSoft HelpDesk for Human Resources:

Search Criteria Specific to PeopleSoft Service Center for Higher Education

These fields are specific to PeopleSoft Service Center for Higher Education:

Search Commands

Here are the search commands that you can use on the Case Search pages:

Search Results

After you perform a search, the system displays information in the Search Results grid. Click any entry in the grid to navigate to the Case page. If you're adding a new case, the system enters the caller information on the Case page.

The fields in the results grid correspond to the search criteria fields. The fields that appear depend on your search criteria. For example, if you searched based on phone number or email address, the Search Results grid displays that information.

See Also

Setting Up Security and User Preferences

Search Strategies

Here are some search tips:

• You can enter partial values in any field except Case, Business Unit, and National ID.

  For example, if you select begins with as the operator and then enter Pleas in the City field, the search results include a list of all cases with city names that start with Pleas.

• You can enter the least amount of data that is needed to limit the search results.

  Entering extra information is time-consuming and increases the likelihood of a typographical error that prevents the system from finding any information.

  For example, if caller Larry Green provides his name, you can perform a search using that information without asking for his phone number or email address. If there are multiple Larry Greens, you can select one of the Larry Greens from the search results.

• A case number uniquely identifies a case. Searching for existing cases by case number displays the Case page (this involves the fewest keystrokes).

• A search is not case-sensitive.

Managing Basic Case Information

This section discusses how to:

• Record partner information.

• Record customer and employee information.

• Enter case information.

• Use the actions section.

• Escalate cases.

• Match cases.

• Send notifications.

• View the installed product hierarchy.

• Use entitlement matches.

• Use entitlement defaults.

• Select provider groups.

• Select workers.

Note. The information that is available on the Case page is conditional and is based on the template that you or your implementation team have assigned to the business unit.

Pages Used to Manage Basic Case Information

Recording Partner Information

Access the Partner Information section on the Case page.

Depending on the display template, this section may be hidden. Modify the display template if you want the Partner Information section visible on the Case page. If you have purchased PeopleSoft Enterprise PRM for Service, the display template contains partner section and field options, which are delivered disabled. The two display layout options for this group box are within the Case Information section or as its own section on the Case page.

Note. To enable the Partner section, you must purchase PeopleSoft Partner Relationship Management.

Recording Customer and Employee Information

Access the Customer section on the Case page in PeopleSoft Support and HelpDesk.

Customer Information

In PeopleSoft Support cases, this group box displays information about the customer who reported the problem. In HelpDesk and HelpDesk for Human Resources cases, this group box displays employee information. In Service Center for Higher Education, this group box displays a combination of these types of information, since such a case can be created for a company contact, consumer, or employee.

Select the Show Details link to see more information about the customer.

Note. The visibility of fields in this section depends on the Business Object Search setup, the display template that is used, and how you modify the display template.

These fields are used by PeopleSoft Support:

Employee Information

Access the Employee Information section on the Case page in PeopleSoft HelpDesk for Human Resources.

In PeopleSoft HelpDesk cases, the Employee Information group box displays information about the employee who reported the problem.

Note. The visibility of the fields in this section is dependent on the display template that is used and how you modify the display template. If an agent has access to view secured data, the system displays information for the Contact Method, Edit, Phone, Email, Address, Status, and Gender fields. Secured worker information is home phone number, home email address, and home address. If the agent does not have access to view secured data, the system hides the data for these fields and the agent can only view data that is not secured.

These fields are used by PeopleSoft HelpDesk and HelpDesk for Human Resources:

Contact Method

Click the Edit link to edit a person's preferred method of contact. A secondary page appears.

Note that any emails initiated from a case by AAF will use the contact method associated with the recipient's role, regardless of whether the case has an email contact method with the type For This Case Only.

Additional Fields in the Customer Section

Depending on the display template, these fields may or may not be enabled. The Billing and Account fields are available only for these PeopleSoft CRM solutions: Contact Center for Insurance, Contact Center for Communications, Contact Center for Energy, and Contact Center for Banking.

Academic Information Section

Access the Academic Information section on the Case page in PeopleSoft Service Center for Higher Education.

After identifying a constituent for a case in PeopleSoft Service Center for Higher Education, an agent will be able to view a display-only summary of the constituent's academic information.

See Also

Case Creation

Entering Case Information

Access the Case Information section on the Case page in PeopleSoft Support, HelpDesk, HelpDesk for Human Resources, or Service Center for Higher Education (Support, Add Case, Case or HelpDesk, Add Case, Case or HR HelpDesk, Add Case, Case, or Analyst Service Center, Add Case, Case).

This section contains the Case attribute fields. The fields on the Case Information section are grouped using the Embedded Tabs Section layout. Use the display template to control which fields the system displays on which tabs. Also, display templates control the visibility of fields within the section.

See Configuring Display Templates for Components.

See Understanding Assignment Options.

Enter information about the case in the following fields:

Main

More

Additional Fields in the Case Information Section

Use the display template to control the visibility of these fields. You can choose whether these fields appear on the Main tab or the More tab.

Note. The system updates the response met and restore met dates and times for all cases, even if the case does not have an associated agreement with an entitlement.

See Configuring Display Templates for Components.

See Also

Setting Up Call Center Prompt Tables

Validating Errors Reported by Callers

Tracking Installed Products

Using Business Projects

Using the Actions Section

Access the Actions section on the Case page.

The Action Link Groups that you or your implementation team set up during installation appear in the Related Actions group box on the Case page. You can set up links in the Related Actions drop-down list box to create service orders and defects and to look for offers and promotions.

When the system loads the items in the Related Actions drop-down list box, it checks to see if the link definition is setID enabled. If it is, then the setID of the link definition is matched with the setID of the case, which is obtained from Case business unit. If the two setIDs do not match, then the system does not populate that link definition in the drop-down list box. When the Case page is loaded and the user changes the business unit, the system reloads the items in the Actions drop-down list box.

In PeopleSoft HelpDesk for Human Resources, you can link to pages in the PeopleSoft or E-Business Human Resources (HR) database (depending on which HR database your system is integrated with).

In PeopleSoft Service Center for Higher Education, you can link to pages in the PeopleSoft Campus Solutions application.

PeopleSoft Support, HelpDesk, and Service Center for Higher Education applications offer the capability to link to predefined actions from the Case page. You can execute actions on the Actions section of the Case Page, the Summary page, or the Related Actions page.

Note that in Service Center for Higher Education, some listed actions may not be applicable for all roles (constituent, company contact, or worker). If an action is attempted for someone who does not have a role that permits that action, an error message will be displayed to inform the user that the action is not available.

See Managing Related Actions.

The PeopleSoft system delivers these predefined actions:

• Asset Administrator

• Asset Summary

• Branch Script

• Business Project

• Case Survey

• Change Request - Create New

• Change Request - Relate

• Create RMA

• Defect - Create New

• Defect - Relate Existing

• Offer History

• Sales Lead

• Sales Order

• Service Order

• Remote Control

• Software Delivery

• Work Order - Create New

Note. To create a related action to the Offer Presentation page in PeopleSoft Order Capture, you must set up the link using the Link Group pages. To display the Get Offers or Promotions icon, you must set it up using an AAF policy.

See Setting Up Links and Related Actions.

See Working with Active Analytics Framework.

Suggest Action

The system automatically displays a suggested action that the agent can perform. This suggestion is driven by policies that you set up in AAF.

See Configuring Suggested Actions for Cases.

Links

The system displays a category name (for example, Human Resources, Benefits, Related Actions) for specific links in a category and a Go button.

Depending on the security established for the links that are set up as content references (CREFs), an agent can view all links or a subset of the links. Note that only permission list security definitions from the content reference will be used for determining link visibility. If the user does not have access to any links in a category, the category does not appear.

See PeopleSoft Enterprise HRMS Application Fundamentals PeopleBook

See PeopleSoft Enterprise Benefits Administration PeopleBook

See Also

Setting Up Links and Related Actions

Setting Up Content References

Escalating Cases

Access the Case page.

Use the Escalate Case button to send notifications to agents and managers. If you have associated an AAF trigger point with the button, the system displays a message when a user clicks the Escalate Case button.

Note. The PeopleSoft system does not deliver the Escalate Case button with any associated trigger points. You must use the functionality within AAF to activate this button before you implement your PeopleSoft call center applications.

When the user clicks OK, the system increments the escalation count, saves the escalation date and time, saves the case, and sets off one of these trigger points in AAF:

• When a Support Case is Escalated

• When a Help Desk Case is Escalated

See Working with Active Analytics Framework.

Matching Cases

Access the Match Results page by clicking the Match Cases button on any page in the Case component.

The Match Cases page enables you to see any existing cases that match the current case. This lets you see if the current issue has already been recorded in another case. Any cases that match the current case will be displayed.

Note. If no existing cases meet the match criteria, the Match Results page will be displayed with a message indicating that no matches were found.

If case matching is not enabled for the business unit of the current case, the Match Results page will be displayed with a message indicating that no match criteria have been defined for this business unit.

See Understanding Call Center Prompt Tables.

See Defining Call Center Business Units.

Sending Notifications

Access the Outbound Notification page (click the Notification button or Set Reminder button on the Case page (or any page with the case toolbar).

The Outbound Notification page behaves slightly different if the Set Reminder toolbar button is clicked to access the page as opposed to the Notification button:

• The Send and Send and Solve Case toolbar buttons are unavailable.

• The system makes the sender of the notification the TO recipient of the notification.

See Sending Manual Notifications From CRM Transactions.

Viewing the Installed Product Hierarchy

Access the Installed Product Viewable Hierarchy page (click the View Product Hierarchy button on the Information section of the Case page).

For more information about viewing the installed product hierarchy, refer to the following PeopleBook.

See Tracking Installed Products.

Using Entitlement Matches

Access the Entitlement Match page (click the Select Agreement or Warranty link on the Case page).

For more information about using entitlement matches, refer to the following PeopleBook.

See Performing Entitlement Searches for Cases and Service Orders.

Using Entitlement Defaults

Access the Entitlement Details page (click the available warranty or agreement line link on the Case page).

For more information about using entitlement defaults, refer to the following PeopleBook.

See Setting Up and Managing Agreements and Warranties.

Selecting Provider Groups

Access the Provider Group Summary page (click the Suggest a Provider Group button on the Case page).

For more information about selecting provide groups, refer to the following PeopleBook.

See Setting Up and Performing Assignment Searches.

Selecting Workers

Access the Candidate Summary page (click the Suggest an Agent button on the Case page).

For more information about selecting workers, refer to the following PeopleBook.

See Defining Workers.

Validating Errors Reported by Callers

This section provides an overview of error message validation and discusses how to validate an error.

The Validate button is delivered hidden. If you want to validate errors reported by callers, modify the display template to enable the links.

Error Message Validation

When you support products such as software or electronics that provide users with diagnostic error messages, looking up frequently used solutions using the error message is an efficient way to resolve cases.

You record error information on the Case page. The system does not force you to select from known error messages. Instead, you can enter whatever error information the caller provides. The appearance of this button is activated in the Display Template Details page. If it is activated in the display template, the button appears on the page. If it isn't activated in the display template, then the system does not display it.

When you enter an error code, the system goes through the following process to ensure that a corresponding entry appears in the Error table (ERROR_MESS_TBL):

1. The system checks whether the data that you entered is an unambiguous match for a single known error.

   If a match is found, the system associates the case with the known error.

   An unambiguous match is not necessarily an exact match. For example, if the case does not specify the error code but it has a message that is an exact match for a known message, then the system considers the match an unambiguous match. However, an error code alone is never sufficient for an unambiguous match because different products might use the same code for different purposes.

2. If no unambiguous match is established, you can click the Validate button to access the Error Validation page.

   From this page, you can:

   • Search for similar errors.

     If you find and select an error, the system associates the case with that error. The search is a Verity-based keyword search, so it does not require an exact match—a close match suffices. This search helps you find the error even if you don't type the full text of the error message or if you have typographical errors in your data.

   • Create a new error record using the error code and error message that you entered on the Case page.

     This process facilitates the process of adding error records to the database. Error records are established as the errors are reported, and you can avoid the initial work of creating records for all possible errors.

Page Used to Validate Errors

Validating an Error

Access the Error Validation page (click the Validate button within the Case Information group box on the Case page).

Error Code and Error Message	Displays the error code and error message that are prepopulated using the data from the Case page.
Search	Click to search for existing errors.
Create New Error	Click to create a new error record using the error code and message on the Error Validation page. If you changed the information on this page, the system updates the error code and message on the Case page to reflect the change. When you create a new error, the system associates the underlying case with the system-generated ID that is assigned to the error. The presence of an error ID on the case record indicates that the error has been validated.
Return to Case	Click to leave the page without validating the error. As long as the error remains unvalidated, the Validate button on the Case page remains available.

Integrating with Third-Party Asset Management Applications

PeopleSoft HelpDesk gives IT support personnel the ability to pass case information to a third-party asset management application in the performance of asset management tasks. Assets can be any network-connected device, such as a computer, peripheral, or router.

PeopleSoft HelpDesk provides the framework to launch the third-party application from the case toolbar and from the Related Actions sections. PeopleSoft HelpDesk has two toolbar buttons—one for Asset Discovery and one for Remote Control. These buttons launch a third-party asset management application and pass information specific to the case to the third-party applications. The information from the case is passed in the URL. Case information that is passed is typically a person or asset ID, such as employee ID number or the asset tag.

The system captures the date and time when an agent launches the asset management application on the Related Actions page.

To set up case information transfer:

• Set up the link in the Link Definition page.

• Modify the content reference and point it at the Asset Management application installed at your site.