Generic vs Customized Request Types

This article is outdated and no longer updated. Please see our documentation on Service Types for more.

You will need to identify generic request types that suit all needs and a client specific request types that only work for one company.

The best practice is to keep a good balance of both types of requests. Most MSPs when they first start with DeskDirector go for the global request type approach, where they create 5-10 request types that fit roughly the needs of all their clients. This is a vanilla approach; you are missing out on terrific value-add opportunities. But if you take the other extreme, you end up with multiple duplicate request types and a mess when trying to edit one for a specific company. The right balance is up to you to find; however, the best way is to think about your current structure. Do all tickets go into a single board/queue? Do some clients have their own? If so, you can create generic request types and duplicate it so that the duplicate has a filter and point to the different location.

Alternatively, look into workflows from your PSA, maybe you can use a generic request type and send it to the right place from your PSA, saving you a request type. Think about how you onboard a new client, you want to make sure they have the right access to the right request types from the moment they are onboard. If you must go out of your way to add a company to a request type, maybe you need to re-evaluate how you approach the topic. Don’t be afraid to plan a re-do. Request types can be enabled or disabled easily, and ticket or filter settings can easily be copied from one request to the other, allowing you to trial many layouts before deciding on one.

Think about request type management as cable management, a tangle of cable might work as it should, but when you need to make a slight change, you are in for a lot of wasted time. If you aim to keep your cables neat, then any changes in the future are a breeze.

To learn how to build request types inside DeskDirector, read this article.

Here's an article on the 10 most popular request types.

How did we do?

Contact