Helpdesk
What is a helpdesk?
Helpdesk is the collective term for the desk where questions and reports arrive. The term covers both a team and the software, and that confuses matters when choosing.
In short
A helpdesk is the central point where questions, faults and reports arrive and are handled. The term refers both to the team doing that work and to the software supporting it. Historically the term comes from IT, where a helpdesk handles internal faults; in customer contact it's used for the desk facing customers.
An internal helpdesk and a customer helpdesk are different things
An internal helpdesk serves colleagues and works with known users, fixed equipment and usually a priority scheme based on impact on work. A customer helpdesk serves people you don't know, through channels you don't control, about orders and expectations.
Software built for one rarely fits the other well. A package with strong features for asset management and change requests doesn't help you with a question about a parcel that wasn't delivered.
Why the term says little when choosing software
Nearly every package in this market calls itself a helpdesk, ticket system or customer service platform, and those words are used interchangeably. So for a choice they say nothing. What does say something is which channels arrive, what customer data sits alongside and whether the system can also carry out actions.
Helpdesk or service desk?
| Helpdesk | Service desk | |
|---|---|---|
| Purpose | Answering questions and faults | Managing all service delivery around a system |
| Works with | Tickets | Incidents, changes and requests |
| Usually for | Customers or users | Internal organisation, often IT |
| Origin | Grown out of phone support | Grown out of ITIL and process management |
For customer contact at a webshop or service business, helpdesk is the usable term. Service desk belongs to an IT organisation managing changes and requests alongside faults, and that extra structure costs time you don't want to spend on customer questions.
Where it goes wrong
Choosing an IT helpdesk package for customer contact
Packages that come from IT management are strong on change requests and asset registration, and weak on webshop integrations and channels like chat and WhatsApp. Check where a package comes from before going by the feature list.
Assuming the term says something about AI
Helpdesk says nothing about whether the system can answer on its own. That's a separate question with a separate answer, and usually a separate price too.
What to do this week
Write down which channels arrive with you and which data an agent needs per question. Test every package calling itself a helpdesk against that. The term then falls away as a criterion by itself, and you're left with the questions that do matter.
What this looks like in a system
Cuego is built for customer contact rather than internal asset management. Email, chat, voice and messaging channels arrive in the same environment, with the customer card and the order alongside. What other packages add as a separate helpdesk module, such as a knowledge base and customer portal, belongs to the same platform here.
Helpdesk softwareRelated terms
Ticket system
A ticket system gives every customer question a number, an owner and a status. That sounds administrative and is exactly what stops questions from getting lost.
Read onShared inbox
A shared inbox lets a team work in the same mailbox. It works well until questions start running longer than a day.
Read onCustomer service
Customer service is answering questions your own setup caused. That sounds harsh and it's the most usable definition there is.
Read on