Help Desk — User Guide

Who can use Help Desk

Enable the Help Desk module from Marketplace (free) — no other modules are required first. Your role must include the relevant permissions (view, create, update, delete, restore, force.delete, assign, close, reopen as needed).

Without assign, you only see tickets assigned to you.

Help Desk is for internal workspace support. To report bugs or request platform features, use Give Feedback — that flow is triaged in Central, not in Help Desk.

File a complaint (quick create)

When Help Desk is installed and your role includes create, you can open a short complaint dialog from the shared shell (same places as Give Feedback):

• User menu (avatar, top right) → File a complaint
• Command palette (Ctrl/⌘ + K) → File a complaint under Actions

Enter a subject, optional description, category, and priority. Submitting creates a normal Help Desk ticket (for example HD-00042) and shows a toast with an Open ticket link. This is for workspace support only — use Give Feedback for EloSync product bugs and feature requests.

The menu entry is hidden when Help Desk is not installed or you lack help-desk.create.

List, board & table

Open Help Desk from the sidebar, under the Operations group. Switch Board / List in the page header (defaults to Board, same pattern as Tasks). On the board, columns are the fixed statuses Open → In Progress → Waiting → Resolved → Closed; drag a card to change status (honors update / close / reopen permissions and the status workflow). Search by subject, number, or description; filter by status, priority, category, or SLA (breached / at risk); toggle My Tickets or Overdue; and switch KPI cards (including SLA breached / SLA at risk) to quick-filter. The list table shows category, status, priority, SLA badge, source (Email), assignee, due date, and the latest note.

Use Manage categories (visible with help-desk.create, help-desk.update, or help-desk.delete) to add, rename, activate/deactivate, or delete workspace ticket categories. New workspaces start with General, Technical, Billing, Account, and Other. You cannot delete Other (default for new tickets). You also cannot delete a category that still has tickets. Renaming a starter category keeps its slug.

Use Manage SLAs to define response and resolve targets (minutes) optionally scoped by category and/or priority. The most specific matching active policy applies when a ticket is created (or when priority/category changes while still open). Breaches notify the assignee and appear in the list/KPIs.

Use Manage mailboxes to connect a shared support IMAP inbox (separate from personal Email accounts). New inbound mail creates a ticket (source=email); replies that mention the ticket number (e.g. HD-00042) append an unauthored note. When Contacts is installed, new tickets soft-link a contact whose email matches the sender.

• Users with restore can filter Active / Include deleted / Deleted only, then Restore a soft-deleted ticket from the row menu
• Delete permanently requires help-desk.force.delete — granted to the workspace owner by default

Dashboard widget

When Help Desk is installed and you have help-desk.view, the dashboard may show My open tickets (help_desk_my_open) — open tickets assigned to you, with a link to the full list.

Create a ticket

1. Click New ticket
2. Enter a subject and optional description
3. Choose category (from your workspace list) and priority
4. Optionally set a due date (interpreted in your workspace timezone)
5. If Contacts or Companies are installed, optionally link a contact and/or company — use New beside a picker to create and select inline when you have create permission
6. If Knowledge Base is installed, optionally link one or more articles (published articles for view-only users; editors with knowledge-base.update can also link drafts)
7. Optionally set an assignee (requires assign); otherwise the ticket defaults to you
8. Save

Edit from the row menu or the ticket page while the ticket is not Closed. Closed tickets must be Reopened before content edits.

Status workflow

A ticket starts Open. Move it forward with status actions or the status picker:

• In progress (open → in_progress)
• Waiting (open | in_progress → waiting) — e.g. blocked on customer reply
• Resolved (open | in_progress | waiting → resolved)
• Close (open | in_progress | waiting | resolved → closed) — requires help-desk.close
• Reopen (resolved → open or closed → open) — requires help-desk.reopen

Invalid transitions are rejected with a validation error. Use Close for a terminal closed state; Resolved can still move to Closed or back to Open.

Optional contact / company links

Both links are soft — they only appear in the create/edit form when the corresponding module (Contacts / Companies) is installed on your workspace, and they're always optional even when installed. A ticket without either link works the same; the links are for cross-referencing to CRM records.

Optional Knowledge Base links

When Knowledge Base is installed, the create/edit form shows a Knowledge base articles multi-select. Linked articles appear under Related articles on the ticket view (links open the article record). On the article view, Linked tickets lists tickets that reference that article when Help Desk is also installed. No hard module dependency — either module can be installed without the other; links are simply unavailable until both are entitled.

Assignment

Users with assign can set or clear the assignee from the ticket page or the create/edit form. The assignee receives an in-app notification when someone else assigns them.

Notes & timeline

• Notes — free-form internal notes on the ticket
• Timeline — history of create, update, assignment, status change, note, and delete/restore events

Due dates & overdue

Set an optional due date on create or edit. Overdue filtering and KPIs compare due_at against the current instant using the workspace timezone convention (same as Tasks and Leads follow-ups). Tickets in Resolved or Closed are excluded from the overdue count.

SLAs

Define policies under Manage SLAs. Each policy sets first-response and resolve targets in minutes, optionally limited to a category and/or priority. Open tickets get response/resolve clocks; the first staff note or status leave from Open counts as first response. Breached tickets notify the assignee and show on the list/KPIs. Manual due_at remains independent of SLA clocks.

Email intake

Manage mailboxes connects a shared support IMAP account for the workspace (not the personal Email module). New messages create tickets marked Email; replies that include the ticket number append a note. Sync runs on a schedule and can be triggered manually.

What's not here yet

Customer portal and chat/social intake channels are planned but not part of this module yet — see the Product Roadmap. Ticket notes support @mentions. Use Board / List for status Kanban. Soft-gated WhatsApp Communication Templates appear on ticket view when that module is installed and the contact has a phone.

When Communication Templates is installed and you have communication-templates.use, open a ticket with a linked contact that has a phone number and click WhatsApp to pick a Help Desk template (or a blank chat). EloSync opens WhatsApp Web/app with the message pre-filled — it does not send messages for you.

Ask EloSync

With the AI Assistant module installed, Ask EloSync can list open tickets, fetch a ticket by UUID, and propose status changes, assignments, or notes. Nothing is saved until you confirm the suggestion. See AI Assistant.