Freshservice: Keeping things simple in the IT Management World
May 03, 2016
Freshservice: Keeping things simple in the IT Management World
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Overall Satisfaction with Freshservice
We use Freshservice as our ITIL solution. To address our needs for an infrastructure library, knowledgebase, change management system, and trouble ticket solution, Freshservice was implemented on campus a little over a year ago. It is primarily used by our IT staff, however all employees and students interact with the system to report issues and request services.
Previously, our IT documentation, inventory, and licensing were spread across several systems which made it inefficient for our organization. Additionally, we liked the self-service capabilities of the service catalog that is built-into the software.
Previously, our IT documentation, inventory, and licensing were spread across several systems which made it inefficient for our organization. Additionally, we liked the self-service capabilities of the service catalog that is built-into the software.
- Change management is a great asset of the system. It allows you to gain approvals, and document the entire process. Over the years we have chosen specific routes to address technology needs on campus only to wonder why did it that way a few years down the road.
- The service catalog is valuable in that allows you to detail everything you can provide to your constituents. You can create your own forms, indicate anticipated delivery, and specify costs. This puts great information in front of your users from the get go.
- The CMDB allows you to keep inventory of all assets, hardware and software, and create relationships. The information you put into the system can assist in decision-making, troubleshooting, and monitoring ROI.
- Freshservice's built-in reports offer quick metrics to monitor your service goals
- While the CMDB is robust and helpful, you don't have much control over the view when looking at the preview grid.
- We previously used the sister product, Freshdesk, and we appreciated the built-in chat feature. It would be nice to see Freshservice add this to their product so that we don't have to rely on third-party systems to communicate inter-departmentally, or with constituents.
- The ticket system is intuitive and has some great features. But one of the things that is inherent with technical support is multi-part tasks related to a particular solution. While Freshservice allows you to create tasks that must be completed which you can assign to any of the other agents, it would be nice to be able to create task templates for situations that require several standard sub-tasks. For example, with computer setups if you could apply a "setup" template that identifies the various steps that must be completed so that you can monitor progress more closely, and offer quality assurance.
- The service catalog has simplified and reduced inquiries about purchasing equipment, requesting forms, and identifying software that is available to campus. We estimate a 25% reduction in such inquiries
- Canned responses and the ability to insert solutions allows our staff to spend more time supporting our users, rather than looking up answers and typing responses.
- Using the CMDB to document infrastructure, business processes, and training material has allowed IT staff to get-up-to-speed and identify answers to questions more quickly. Additionally, the documentation is advantageous for other departments across campus so that we can show impact of business process changes.
- Freshdesk and Spiceworks
The feature sets, intuitive nature, and hosted options were all attractive to us as we looked for a ITIL- centric solution. The interface, and ability to be up-and-running in a very short amount of time drove us to invest in Freshservice.