FS-DOC-03Operations
Process Runbook / SOP
IT Helpdesk Request Handling
[YourCompany.com] · IT Department · Prepared by FullSpec · [Today's Date]
This runbook is the day-to-day operating guide for the IT Helpdesk Request Handling automation. It tells your team exactly what the system does on its own, where a human decision is still required, how to handle things when something goes wrong, and who to call when you need help. FullSpec builds, monitors, and maintains the automation end to end. Your team's only regular responsibility is working the tickets themselves and responding to genuine escalation alerts.
01Process overview
The IT Helpdesk Request Handling automation captures every employee support request the moment it arrives, whether that comes through an intake form, a monitored email address, or a Slack slash command. An AI triage agent reads the request, assigns a category and a priority level, creates a fully populated ticket in Freshdesk, and routes it to the best-fit technician based on current workload. Both the requester and the technician receive an immediate Slack notification. If a high-priority ticket stalls beyond its SLA window, PagerDuty fires an escalation alert to the IT manager. When the technician marks the ticket resolved, the automation writes a structured summary to the Notion knowledge base, so recurring issues can be solved faster next time. The system handles approximately 90 requests per month and replaces eight of the ten original manual steps, saving around seven hours of staff time every week.
Process name
IT Helpdesk Request Handling
Trigger
A new IT support request is received via intake form, monitored email, or Slack slash command
Final output
Ticket resolved in Freshdesk and resolution summary written to the Notion knowledge base
Agents running
Triage and Priority Agent; Assignment and Notification Agent; Escalation and Resolution Logger
Tools involved
Freshdesk, Slack, Google Workspace, PagerDuty, Notion, automation platform
Weekly volume
Approximately 90 requests per month (roughly 22 per week)
Human checkpoint
IT Manager reviews and approves action on P1/P2 escalation alerts fired via PagerDuty
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02Step-by-step: what happens and who acts
What you actually need to do: There is one human step in this process. When PagerDuty fires an escalation alert for a stalled P1 or P2 ticket, the IT Manager must review the alert, open the Freshdesk ticket, and decide whether to reassign, escalate further, or resolve it directly. Every other step is handled automatically. Working the ticket itself (diagnosing and fixing the issue) remains with the assigned technician, but that is technical work, not a process step the automation can replace.
Step
What happens
Who acts
Type
1
A new support request arrives through the intake form, a monitored Google Workspace email address, or a Slack slash command. The automation platform detects the submission and starts the workflow immediately.
Automation platform
Automated
2
The Triage and Priority Agent reads the full request text, matches it against category keywords (hardware, software, access, general), and assigns a priority level from P1 (critical) to P4 (low). No human reads the message at this stage.
Triage and Priority Agent
Automated
3
A new ticket is created in Freshdesk with the category, priority, requester name, and original message body pre-filled. No manual data entry is required and duplicate detection prevents the same request being logged twice.
Triage and Priority Agent / Freshdesk
Automated
4
For P3 and P4 tickets the Assignment and Notification Agent checks current open ticket counts per technician in Freshdesk and assigns the ticket to the technician with the lightest load for that category. For P1 and P2 tickets the IT Manager is immediately notified via PagerDuty to confirm or override the assignment.
Assignment and Notification Agent
Automated
5
The requester receives a Slack message confirming their ticket number, category, priority level, and the name of the technician assigned to their request. This fires within seconds of the ticket being created.
Assignment and Notification Agent / Slack
Automated
6
The assigned technician receives a separate Slack notification containing the ticket summary, category, priority, and a direct link to the Freshdesk ticket so they can begin work immediately without checking their inbox.
Assignment and Notification Agent / Slack
Automated
7
The technician works the issue, updating the Freshdesk ticket with progress notes as they go. This is technical work performed by the assigned person and is outside the scope of the automation.
IT Technician
Human
8
The Escalation and Resolution Logger monitors open ticket age. If a P1 or P2 ticket has not been updated or resolved within the configured SLA window, PagerDuty fires an escalation alert to the IT Manager with ticket details and elapsed time. The IT Manager must then review and act on the alert.
Escalation and Resolution Logger / IT Manager
Human
9
Once the technician marks the ticket as resolved in Freshdesk, the automation automatically sends the requester a closing Slack message confirming resolution and inviting them to reopen if the issue persists.
Escalation and Resolution Logger / Slack
Automated
10
On resolution, the Escalation and Resolution Logger writes a structured entry to the Notion knowledge base, including the ticket category, a summary of the fix, and the step-by-step resolution notes from the Freshdesk ticket. No additional effort is required from the technician.
Escalation and Resolution Logger / Notion
Automated
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03Handling exceptions
Situation
What the system does
What you do
Request arrives with missing or incomplete information (no subject, single-word description, or no contact details)
The Triage and Priority Agent cannot confidently classify the request. It creates a Freshdesk ticket flagged as 'Incomplete' with a P4 default priority and sends the requester a Slack message asking them to provide more detail using a short prompt.
No immediate action needed. If the requester does not respond within 24 hours, the IT Manager or IT Support Lead should follow up directly. Update the intake form instructions to reduce repeat occurrences.
A duplicate request is submitted (same requester, same issue, within 60 minutes)
The automation detects a match on requester email and request text similarity above the configured threshold. The second submission is suppressed and a note is appended to the original open ticket. The requester receives a Slack message referencing their existing ticket number.
No action required. If a duplicate is incorrectly suppressed (a genuinely separate issue flagged as a duplicate), the IT Manager can re-open a new ticket manually in Freshdesk and merge or unlink as needed.
The Triage and Priority Agent assigns an incorrect category or priority level
The ticket is created in Freshdesk with the agent's best-guess classification. The ticket record shows the original classification and confidence score so the decision is auditable.
The IT Manager or assigned technician can override the category and priority directly in Freshdesk at any time. If misclassifications happen frequently in a particular category, notify the FullSpec team at support@gofullspec.com so the triage rules can be updated.
A P1 or P2 ticket stalls and the IT Manager does not respond to the PagerDuty escalation alert within the SLA window
PagerDuty re-fires the alert on a timed escalation schedule (default: every 15 minutes for up to three cycles). If the alert remains unacknowledged after three cycles, it escalates to the secondary on-call contact configured in PagerDuty.
Acknowledge the PagerDuty alert as soon as possible, even if you cannot resolve the ticket immediately. Update the secondary on-call contact in PagerDuty whenever the team's on-call rota changes. Do not leave the escalation policy pointing at a former staff member.
A connected tool is unavailable (Freshdesk, PagerDuty, or Notion has an outage or returns an error)
The automation platform retries the failed step up to three times with a two-minute delay between each attempt. If all retries fail, the workflow pauses and sends an error notification to the IT Manager via Slack, including the request details so the ticket can be logged manually in the interim.
Log the ticket manually in Freshdesk if the outage lasts more than 10 minutes. Contact the FullSpec team at support@gofullspec.com if the error persists or if the automation does not resume automatically once the tool recovers. Check the tool's own status page to confirm whether the issue is on their side.
A requester submits a request through an unmonitored channel (a personal email, a direct message to a technician, or a channel not connected to the intake flow)
The automation has no visibility of requests that arrive outside the configured intake channels. These tickets will not be created automatically and the requester will not receive a confirmation.
Redirect the requester to the correct intake channel and ask them to resubmit. Remind the wider team of the correct intake path during the next all-hands or team update. If a particular unmonitored channel is generating frequent requests, contact the FullSpec team to discuss adding it as a connected source.
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04Who to contact and when
Fill in the rows marked with placeholders once your team is confirmed. Keep this table updated whenever a role changes hands so escalations reach the right person every time.
Role
Name
How to reach them
IT Manager (process owner)
[Your name]
[Rep email]
IT Support Lead
[Your name]
[Rep email]
Operations Director (escalation approver)
[Your name]
[Rep email]
PagerDuty secondary on-call
[Your name]
[Rep email]
FullSpec builder (build and config questions)
FullSpec team
support@gofullspec.com
FullSpec support (errors, outages, changes)
FullSpec support
support@gofullspec.com
Contact FullSpec at support@gofullspec.com for any of the following: the automation stops processing new requests; Freshdesk tickets are not being created; Slack notifications stop firing; PagerDuty escalations are not triggering; or you need to change a triage rule, SLA threshold, or intake channel. Do not attempt to edit the underlying workflow configuration directly. Changes made outside the agreed process can break downstream steps.
05Ongoing maintenance
Whenever a new ticket category or sub-category is needed
Send the new category name, a sample of 3 to 5 example request descriptions, and the intended default priority to the FullSpec team. FullSpec will update the triage agent's classification rules and confirm the change has been tested before it goes live.
IT Manager + FullSpec team
Whenever a Slack or Freshdesk notification template needs updating (wording, links, or contact details)
Send the revised template text to the FullSpec team with a note on which notification it applies to. FullSpec will apply and test the change. Do not edit templates directly in the automation platform.
IT Manager + FullSpec team
Monthly spot-check (first week of each month)
Open Freshdesk and review the last 30 days of tickets. Confirm that categories and priorities look accurate, that no tickets are stuck in an open state without activity, and that the Notion knowledge base has received new entries. Flag anything unusual to the FullSpec team.
IT Manager or IT Support Lead
Monthly error-log review (first week of each month)
Check the automation platform's error log for any failed steps or retries in the previous month. If any errors recurred more than twice, contact the FullSpec team to investigate the root cause before they compound.
IT Manager + FullSpec team
Whenever a team member joins, leaves, or changes role
Update technician records in Freshdesk so the load-balancing assignment logic uses accurate data. Update the PagerDuty on-call schedule and the contact table in this runbook. Notify the FullSpec team if the change affects escalation routing.
IT Manager
Quarterly volume and performance review (every three months)
Compare actual ticket volume, average response time, and triage accuracy against the KPI targets (response time under 8 minutes, triage accuracy above 92%, knowledge base coverage 100%). If volume has grown significantly or accuracy has dipped, schedule a review call with the FullSpec team to retune the triage rules or adjust SLA thresholds.
IT Manager + FullSpec team
The most common maintenance issue for this process is outdated triage rules. As your team's request types evolve, new categories emerge that the agent has not been trained on. This causes a cluster of tickets to be misclassified as 'general' and assigned at P4 when they should be P2. If you notice the IT Manager overriding the same category more than two or three times in a week, that is a clear sign the triage rules need updating. Contact the FullSpec team promptly rather than relying on manual overrides as a long-term fix.
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