Requirements checklist
What to ask for when choosing software for technical support centres.
A checklist built from how technical support centres work, to print or save as a PDF and bring to any supplier meeting.
What the software should cover
Tick each one that matters to your business.
- Contact intake and customer match
- Entitlement and warranty check
- Severity and response clocks
- Tiered ticket hand-offs
- Vendor and field escalations
- Fix notes and knowledge articles
- Shift roster and queue board
Roles that need their own access
Who logs in, and what each person may see or change.
- For first-line agents
- For second and third-line engineers
- For shift leads
- For account and contract managers
- For knowledge owners
Reports to ask for
Ask to see each one with your own sample data.
- Tickets by product, severity and client
- First-response and fix time against each plan’s clock
- Tickets handed between tiers, with repeat hand-offs
- Vendor escalations open, with age and last reply
- Repeat faults by product and serial range
- Contract hours and tickets used against each support plan
- Articles published, searched and linked to closed tickets
Systems it may need to connect to
Note which ones you already run.
- Web chat
- SMS
- Telephony call log
- Remote-access session links
- Accounting export
Questions for any vendor
Put these to every supplier you are comparing.
- Does it replace our telephone system?
- Can clocks pause while we wait?
- How does the entitlement check work?
- Can we support several client brands from one team?
- How are vendor escalations tracked?
- Can knowledge articles be limited to certain agents?
- Is remote access software included?
- Can tickets from our current tool be moved over?
- What decides the cost?
Where the work usually breaks today
Circle the ones you recognise. They set the order of the project.
- Agents repeat the steps already tried
- Severity is set by the loudest caller
- Entitlement is checked after the call
- Vendor escalations disappear
- Fixes never reach the knowledge base
Prefer to talk it through? See the technical support centres page.