Connect 2 Manage is a Help Desk (or Call Handling) Application interfaced with a Time and Ticket Tracking Application that allows tracking of hours worked by any number of variables including dates, call (or request, job or work order) ticket, job code, project, and/or person and job tracking.  We'll call these job, project, request or work order transactions "tickets" throughout this document.  E-mails are generated at various points in the workflow process to ensure communication between departments, locations, users or companies.  Based on the security level, different menu options will be displayed for different users.  Time Transactions (start and ending times for employee/contractor by ticket) can be entered directly or generated through the Help Desk by bringing up the ticket and clicking the IN and OUT buttons. The Administration Interface (the "AI") allows you to build your codes and drop down data such as departments and areas or categories, and enter your customers or users, employees or contractors and build your lists and reports.  The AI is your Content Management tool and allows you to customize your system at any time. The work flow process and data fields are customizable to your organization. The description below is an example of how it can be configured. Help Desk  A variety of actions can be taken under this option from the main menu.  Upon selecting the Open Transactions option, a listing of tickets assigned to the user is displayed.  As many as three people can be assigned to any particular type of transaction, so any of the three will see this ticket, call or job.  No one else except the administrator and the user (or customer) who entered it can see this information. Options available are to enter a new Help Desk Call or Job Ticket or to change or view an existing ticket.  Simply click on the ticket number in the list and the detail data for the ticket will be displayed.  For a new ticket the following fields are available and can be changed unless noted otherwise (audit field):      Ticket/Job/Call Number: will be assigned upon initial submission of the ticket.  It cannot be changed.  User Name: determined from the id of the user who submitted the ticket.  Audit field. Phone: obtained and defaulted from user data on file (can be changed). Priority: levels preset for importance, chosen from a drop down list that you build. Department: Department drop down list - you build your departments under the AI. Area description: Drop down area type selection - you build your areas of business under the AI. Approved: N.  Final approval will be N until status 40, Finished, is achieved. Open Date: the date the ticket was started.  Audit field. Open Time: the time the ticket was started.  Audit field. Estimated Time Due: the time the ticket was promised. Assignee: automatic - as set up in the AI and associated with an area.  Up to three can be assigned to any ticket.   The assignee can be changed. Status: A drop down of your work flow process codes - customizable.  Emails can be sent out at certain status codes, as you set up. Comments: an open text data field that you can use in any way you need. User: The last user to submit the ticket is updated automatically when the change is submitted.  Audit field. Changed: The last time changes were submitted is updated automatically.  Audit field. Audit fields cannot be changed by any user. Other data fields are available.   You can add more data fields yourself through the Administration Interface or have us set up new data for you. When you enter a ticket and the SUBMIT button is pressed, an e-mail is sent to the person(s) assigned and the status is automatically updated to Assigned and Notified.  Paging is available for an additional cost, but emails can be received by most cell phones, which is included in the package. When the assigned person begins work on the request, they or the Help Desk Administrator can update the status of the ticket to "Working" and update the Estimated Time and Date Due.  If you have an email interface with your submitter, when the job is ready to be reviewed by the person who submitted it, the assigned person (or Help Desk Administrator) will type in the Solution Description and update the Status to 40 (Finished). When the ticket is Submitted, an e-mail can be automatically generated to the user to verify the solution.   If the submitter agrees that it is finished, he/she changes Approved to Y and submits it.  This will update the Status to 50 (Closed) and it will be moved to the Closed Tickets table.    If not, the submitter enters the Reason User Not Accepting Completion on the ticket and submits it.  If you don't have an email interface with your submitter, the Help Desk Administrator will simply change the status to Closed. If the ticket is cancelled, the person assigned (or the Help Desk Administrator) can go into the ticket and set the status to Cancelled. If the assigned person is waiting on more information from the user, they will set the status to Holding. From the ticket detail screen, the user can use the IN and OUT buttons to generate Time Transactions.  After IN or OUT is clicked, a pop-up screen will prompt for time and date.  If the user clocks IN on a ticket and has not clocked OUT on a previous ticket, the OUT date of the previous ticket will be set to the IN date on the current ticket.   If a user clocks IN for other types of hours (such as Administration or Education), an OUT transaction must be entered.  IN and OUT hours must be for the same day.  Time and Job (Project or Work Order) Tracking The Time Tracking menu option goes directly to the list of time transactions for the user (or all transactions for the administrator) who will get a selection box so that he/she can see selected transactions.  The list can be sorted in any order or any data displayed.   From this list, the New Time Entry button may be used to generate a new time transaction against a ticket or for other types of hours, such as vacation or sick.  The Name, In Time, and In Date for the new time entry will default to the user name and current date and time. Out Time, Out Date, and Comment may be selected.  You can select a Ticket ID or Type Hours (ex:vacation, sick, etc.) to put this time against.  This is used for bill back purposes. Administration Administration provides entry and update of all codes and drop down lists, including setup information such as customers (or users), people available to be assigned to tickets, the codes for entry fields, and an alternate way to list tickets. The files are listed and when one is selected, the first screen that appears is a listing of all the records in that file.   You can choose to add a New record or select an existing one.   When a record is selected, the detail information is displayed and can be changed or the record can be deleted.   The first entry, Company Information, contains company information used for printing reports.  Use Customers/Users to add new users.  This data is used to set the User ID (User), password, and Security Level of everyone who is allowed to sign on the system.  New assignees (problem solvers) are set up via the Assignee File.  The e-mail address to which new tickets will be sent is identified in Assignee File. Closed Tickets The Transactions option displays job tickets that were closed (status 50) or cancelled (status 30).  Reports A list of reports available to the user is displayed.  Many time and job tracking analysis reports are available only for users with higher security level, but those with lower security levels might see the option to create a report of their time and a list of sort and select options.  After you select a report, a screen appears that allows you to further define the report by:       · specifying/changing the report heading  · choosing fields to be included and their sequence  · identifying fields to be used for selection criteria A second screen then lets you specify the selection criteria for the fields chosen. User Instructions A user can obtain instructions on how to enter, check, or approve tickets. Archived Time This provides a list of time entries that have been archived. Maintenance is a user interface that will allow setting some variables that affect sorting, selecting, header text, help text, drop downs, required entry fields, etc.   Each table is listed and can be selected.  Audit Trail The application automatically updates each record with a user, date and time stamp.   However, another option available is the Audit Trail Module which will record every transaction and change with the original record and the changed record along with who and when.